Disguised in Flames
by Exile Wrath
Summary: When a new serial killer and arsonist walks the streets of Los Angeles, the Black Order sends it's best and brightest to track down the criminal. Unfortunately, 3 interns just had to get mixed in as well. Gunfights, poisoning, fires...they better hurry before the Black Order is destroyed. "Life just hates me," Kanda griped. Contains OCs, no romantic OC x Canon. Character death
1. Prologue: Dolls of the Gray Man

**Exile: Hello dear reader! Now before you start reading, I would like to tell you somthing important: This is chock-full of OCs. However, I guaruntee you that there is no OCxCANON. Well, minus the Sibling!KandaOC and Cousin!LaviOC. That's it. Also, this fic is what I'm doing for a Science Fair alternative. If you see anything (i.e,. grammar/ spelling mistakes) Please point it out. Feel free to be as harsh as you like without turning on the flamethrower.**

**Pairings: This fic is more crime-centered than relationship-centered. There will be hints at various pairings, the most obvious being Allena and Laven so far. Oh, and the two mentioned above.**

**Rating: T for character death**

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><p><span>Prologue: Dolls of the Gray Man<span>

**10:14 AM November 16th, 2012  
>California State University of Long Beach, CA<strong>

"Hey, Rei, wake up. The teacher is looking. I said wake up!" Ekaterina Ivanov hissed across the aisle at the sleeping student, Ryuukei Pham. "I know ForenSci might be boring for you, but at least-"

"At least pretend to pay attention, Pham!" Professor Rittai yelled at the sleeper. The only response was more soft snores from the androgynous girl. "Ivanov, if your friend doesn't wake up in ten seconds, count her as the next demonstration." Ekaterina winced at the threat and whacked the base of Rei's neck, making sure to hit a pressure point.

"What the hell, Kat!" Ryuukei, or Rei, yelped in pain, jolting upwards. The awakened 20-year-old glared at her friend, who was now pointedly staring at the professor.

"You fell asleep." Kat replied crossly. "And you do realize that we are in Forensics at the moment." Rei shrunk in her seat and resumed lazily scrawling notes on the lecture, which was on rigor mortis, the stiffening of joints and muscles after death. She mentally sighed. This stuff was basic. Everyone knew what rigor mortis is; heck, it had been on the entrance exam. The Vietnamese girl shrunk even more in her seat.

"Isn't forensics supposed to be interesting?" she thought resignedly, accidently saying it aloud and interrupting the lecturer again. Pr. Rittai stared at Rei with disdain, having clearly heard the wayward remark.

"So, Pham thinks that rigor mortis is boring?" the man called out to the class, eyes boring holes into the top of Rei's head. She nodded reluctantly. "So, Rei, if rigor mortis is so boring, please elaborate exactly what you would like to hear about today then." he sneered. Kat almost palmed her face. Rei was to say the least eccentric, and would probably ask about something so weird that the teachers would give her the look. In eighth grade she had asked about the multiverse theory in Science!

"The Doll of the Gray Man Incident." Rei answered flatly, receiving looks from the surrounding university students. "We're going to learn about it anyway, right?" Silence.

The professor's lips curled into a smile. "Very well. Why don't you explain what it is, Pham, since you want to hear about it so much that you'd disdain rigor mortis, a good way to determine time of death." A few rows away, another student that had been drinking water choked and let out some loud, hacking coughs at the statement. "Is there anything wrong…Ikazuchi?" he asked after consulting the seating chart. Ikazuchi Raikou shook his head, coughing more.

"Nothing, professor." the blond boy replied with a cringe. Rittai had an infamous reputation for strictness, earning the nickname "Solid Clay" from alumni due to the fact that he never changed his stance on a subject no matter what. It didn't help that his name meant "clay solid body" in Japanese.

"The Doll of the Gray Man Incident," Rei began cautiously, standing up, "was a series of killings four years ago, the first death on January 3rd, 2008. 11 people died, and the one thing that they all had in common was that they had a rare genetic mutation which caused abnormal gray skin. They were all killed in the same way, the prefrontal cortex having been removed and the cranium having holes that were common results of lobotomy in the 1940s. They were then hung like dolls, with wires suspending them in mid-air and hung them in different positions. Those were the only things in common with each of the victims. Later, the culprit was sniped and killed by the CIA, according to news reports, on December 1st of the same year. The criminal was-"

"The criminal was never announced." the professor interrupted. Rei frowned and shook her head. "Are you kidding me?"

"The felon was a man known as Adam Earl. In the 1940s he was well known for his successful lobotomy surgeries. However it was revealed that he killed several of his patients, the ones that the American public never heard of due to the fact that those surgeries had been failures. He killed them through injection of cleaning fluids after he discovered the failed results. He pled guilty for those deaths in 1952, and was slated for capital punishment. However, a few weeks before the execution was administered, the Earl somehow escaped. After he was caught again 4 years ago, he pled guilty for all 11 killings at the trial, and was eventually listed for capital punishment once again, which was administered a year following. Interrogation revealed that apparently there had been no motive for the killing spree, and yet they were all premeditated." she said, finishing her monologue. Silence descended on the small class and Rei trembled a bit, remembering when Kanda had first told her about the murders.

"How gruesome." Raikou muttered, shivering.

"_Lex tallionis_- a life for a life." Pr. Rittai said, breaking the silence. "And how is it that you know that it was Adam Earl when said information wasn't released?"

"My brother was one of the first investigators to be assigned on the team. Yuu Kanda is my adoptive brother." she quickly explained. The professor nodded in recognition at the name.

"A genius in the field, apparently." the man muttered.

"Yeah, but an idiot at home." Rei retorted under her breath.

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><p><strong>11:25 AM, November 16th, 2012<br>Black Order Morgue, Los Angeles Branch**

In his office, Yuu Kanda sneezed violently, falling off his chair and startling his long-time friend Lenalee Lee, who worked under him. "Are you okay, Kanda?" she asked. He was briefing her on a new case, and both were awaiting the other investigator on the team. Lenalee was a 5' 6'', 31-year-old Chinese forensic pathologist, and was always immediately recognizable with her green eyes and long, dark green hair tied in two pigtails. She was a very cheery, and got along well with most of her coworkers, although during an autopsy most lab technicians described her as "terrifying".

"Idiot sister is probably talking about me again." he snarled, standing back up and dusting himself off. "Now where is that beansprout?" The Japanese man had never liked being referred to by his first name, and stood at 6'1''. He had an odd dark blue hair which was constantly kept in a long ponytail, making him look like a Japanese samurai of old. It didn't help that he had a collection of swords at home.

"It's Allen, BaKanda!" the white-haired investigator retorted, entering the office and giving his superior a glare at the nickname. Allen Walker was uncharacteristically short for his 32 years of age, being around Lenalee's height, and with his white, trauma-induced hair, had earned him the name "beansprout" from close friends and coworkers, much to his chagrin. "And, sorry that I'm late. Cross came back last night." those within earshot flinched at the mention of Allen's adoptive father.

"It doesn't matter." Kanda growled after hiding his surprise, "Just sit down." Cross Marian was a famous sniper, but the man's personality was horrible enough that everyone in the Black Order Morgue pitied Allen's situation, not that they'd ever say so and incur Allen's dark side.

"So what's the situation?" Lenalee asked after Allen had gotten settled in one of the stiff chairs in Kanda's office. "You usually don't have…that much paperwork on your desk." Kanda was infamous for sporting a neat, paperwork-free desk that everyone envied. However there was a now a large pile awaiting his review and assignment.

"Arsonist and murderer." Kanda said shortly. Allen's eyes narrowed at the words. "Do you guys remember Miranda Lotto, the lady that sold us all the clocks here? And I think she graduated from Innocence Academy with us."

"What about Miranda?" Lenalee asked, remembering the forever nervous, clumsy, and apologetic clockmaker.

"She's dead." he said, leaving a minute of silence for the two in front of him to digest the fact. "You guys probably heard about the fire last night on the news, right?" they nodded slowly, still stunned. "It was arson, plain and simple. Traces of an accelerant were found on the premises after the fire was extinguished, which were Miranda Lotto's clockwork shop, Timekeeper, and a neighboring warehouse. But that's not all." at this, Kanda stood up and went to one of the many file cabinets lining his office, rummaging around it and coming back with a few photographs, which the duo picked up and examined. "The accelerant was probably lubricant oil that she used in her clock repairs."

The pictures were different angles of a badly charred body, with some parts under fallen and similarly burnt grandfather clocks. The last one had a note on the back, which Lenalee read aloud, "Cause of death is presumed to be cranial damage, caused by collapse of observed objects. Autopsy pending." she put it down and glared at Kanda. "I want that autopsy."

"No can do. Fou already came in a while ago and took it. She confirmed the statement, but discovered Miranda also died because one of her ribs broke, puncturing her lung. The lung did her in." he said. "What you two are in here for is that the fire was a disguise for the fact that she was murdered. The fire occurred after she was murdered, because Daisya, the arson investigator, noticed that the wall nearest her death had the upside down V-marks. Those usually show up where the fire starts. Also, those grandfather clocks that are on top of her? They are more burnt than ones in the backroom, which is where she usually did her work. The culprit set the fire to destroy evidence. And that is where you two come in." Allen and Lenalee exchanged looks, at the last line. "We need to figure out the time of death and some other stuff, and Daisya had to go to another fire."

"Wait, so if Allen investigating, what do I need to do?" Lenalee asked, confused. Kanda pinched the bridge of his nose in exasperation.

"You and beansprout are working together. Daisya just gave me a call from uptown; there was another fire there. And a body, too. I'm guessing that it's the same person. You two will be working on these cases until we get the guy. You do the autopsies, beansprout does the field. And besides, I know that you have a M.D in criminology, Lenalee. If it's another serial killer, we'll need both of you. You might accompany beansprout to the scene if you need to. "

"Okay, chief." Allen said, nodding. "I guess there's more info in the papers?" he suddenly felt a chill from Kanda's abruptly happy demeanor.

"Yep. All this paperwork is for the investigator that took on the case, specifically you, beansprout. Now get out of my office." Kanda said with a vindictive smirk. Allen and Lenalee scrambled out, now bearing a of load paperwork, the bane of every investigator and forensic pathologist.

The Black Order Morgue was to say…rather unique. There were branches of it in every major city in the US, and it operated slightly differently than the conventional morgue, with contacts in the police. At best, it could be described as a morgue and a police organization merged together and dubbed "Black Order". They specialized in nationwide cases, but since those only came every four or five years, each morgue took in cases for the city that it covered. It and each city morgue did butt heads over cases, but since the system already had a backload of cases, the government was quite content with forcing most of those on the morgue. Investigators for the morgue had to have gone through the police department for a few years before becoming eligible to apply for a position in the Order. Kanda had put years into becoming the Deputy Chief of the Black Order Los Angeles Branch, and had several case resolutions attributed to him, including the Doll of the Gray Man, or DGM, case. But life didn't go his way, even after all the hard work; his phone rang. Pinching the bridge of his nose again, Kanda looked at the caller ID and almost wanted to punch something. "What do you want, Rei?" he snarled, drumming his desk with his fingertips angrily.

"My intern shift is today, right?" the voice of his adoptive little sister asked excitedly. _Oh, yeah._ Kanda realized absentmindedly. "Right?" Kanda rummaged around his desk drawers, searching for the intern shift calendar.

"Yeah." he replied shortly. "You and that Ekaterina friend of yours. And some person named Raikou Ikazuchi, ring any bells?" On the other side of the line, Rei choked on her sandwich at the name.

"Raikou?" she asked weakly after she recovered. "He's in my Forensic Science class. We share Criminology, too."

"Well remind him, too. You're lucky that this year the Order is allowing Cal State undergraduates to intern here, if it can be called interning. Darned Komui." he replied. "Since you take morning classes only, go meet beansprout at…I'll text you guys the address. Bye." Hanging up, Kanda cradled his head in exhaustion. First he had to deal with Allen and Lenalee, and tell them that an old friend had been murdered. And then he would have to deal with Ryuukei and her companions, and after years of siblinghood, he knew that life was not going to be unfair in his favor anytime soon. And before that…Kanda wisely decided to stop remembering and go grab a cup of coffee before his impending headache got any worse.

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><p><strong>For the sake of my grade:<strong>

**Review?**


	2. 1: Hidden Water

__**Exile: I'm back. I really do need to stop making stories and do the ones I already have running, huh? Enjoy!**

**Ryuukei: Exile only owns Raikou, Kat, various victims, the plotbunny, and me. Thank God she doesn't own DGM or any mentioned serial killers.**

**Exile: *whimpers* I'm glad I don't own those serial killers too. They're scarier than the Earl.**

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><p><em>Los Angeles Zoo,<em> read Rei's smartphone screen. _There was a fire there. Meet the beansprout and Lenalee. Drop by my office first._ She narrowed her eyes at the address, "The zoo?" Hearing her, Kat snatched the phone and laughed.

"Ha, crime really can happen anywhere! We gonna go now?" she questioned. Rei sighed, snatching the phone back and looking hard at the time.

"Get cracking already. We have to wait for Raikou. Turns out he's part of the program too. I already told him that today's our shift during Crim. He said that he'll meet us here in Lot 19." Rei snapped. "We're probably going to carpool with him since I know that you can't crack nuts and drive at the same time, Kat."

"Is this a bad time?" Raikou's voice was heard as he approached the duo. "You sound mad…Pham."

"Call me Rei. I know we've been in the same classed for a while, but I haven't properly introduced myself. Ryuukei Pham," she replied, holding out a hand which he shook. Jabbing her thumb over her shoulder to point at the Russian girl that was cracking hazelnuts in the backseat, she said "That's Kat, Ekaterina Ivanov. I'm just telling you know, she has an obsession with nuts. When there's nothing for her hands to do she'll start cracking nuts. I swear, she's insane," Rei explained with a scowl. Raikou nodded, grinning a bit at the odd fact.

"You already know my name, its Ikazuchi Raikou. I heard in ForenSci today; you're _that_ Kanda Yuu's sister?" he questioned. Rei couldn't help but mentally groan at the question.

"Yeah. _That _one, the one that bagged the DGM case, the deputy Chief of Black Order Morgue LA, the guy that is asked to write scripts for crime movies, the guy that's an absolute _prick_ to his adopted family," Rei retorted, muttering the last line under her breath so that Raikou didn't hear. "Anyway, what should we do? Carpool or separate?"

"I live here in some apartments nearby. You two?" he responded. Kat looked up from the bowl of nuts that she had been busy cracking.

"We share an apartment near 5th and Molino," she deigned to reply, and then went back to shelling a particularly stubborn walnut. "Carpool it is. Can you drive?" At this, Raikou winced.

"Yeah I can, but I can't parallel parking for my life. It was a miracle when I passed my test," he complained. Rei shook her head and opened the car door, getting into the driver's seat.

"Unless you have a death wish, get in and buckle up." she said resignedly. "And you talk to me when we get on the highway, you die." Raikou saw Kat noticeably shiver at the threat and decided that the Viet was probably going to crash them if someone broke her concentration.

The car trip was rather uneventful except for Kat's incessant, random chatter that was largely about different nuts and their properties. "Did you know that the four types of macadamias are poisonous to dogs?" she rambled as Rei finally pulled in to the Black Order parking lot. Raikou was sure that his head would explode at the sheer overload of unnecessary information.

"Kat. We're here." Rei interposed with a grimace, snapping her fingers in front of her friend to catch her attention. "We need to check in with my brother."

"Do you think he'll sign an autograph?" Raikou joked, earning a hard glare as he got out of the car, "I mean, he's a famous investigator!"

"I don't do autographs," Kanda walked up and cut in, startling the trio and making Rei jump. "You're late."

"Holy frag grenades! Don't do that again!" she yelped, getting a derisive laugh from her older brother and Kat. "Shut it! Anyway, you didn't give us a time."

"Really? Well, either way, you're late." Kanda replied, ignoring her protest. "Get in the morgue, grab an intern badge, and get to the zoo. Beansprout's going to fill you in." Hhe strode off without another word, leaving Rei fuming behind.

"Dolt, imbecile, prick, blockhead…" Rei cursed under her breath as the trio made a mad dash into the morgue, and knocked over one certain lab technician.

"Woah, woah, Rei, slow down!" Lavi cried as the paperwork he had been carrying scattered everywhere. Recognizing the voice, Kat spun on her heel and threw herself at the redhead.

"Hi, Lavi," Rei snarled, bending down to pick up the papers. "Kat, greet your cousin later. I'm going to…" the rest was lost as she muttered more insults and death threats directed at her brother under her breath. "Is this our badge?" she asked, holding up a silvery piece of metal. Lavi nodded, patting Kat's head and standing up with a grimace.

"Komui wanted something flashy "for the first interns" and had those made." Lavi quoted. "I'm assuming that it's you three, so I sort of pity you. What did Kanda do this time?"

"Kanda was Kanda." was her half snarl-reply. "Why? What's going on?"

"Arsonist and a murderer going around. We want to catch the guy before he becomes a serial killer," he explained.

"Is there like a, requirement for a murderer to be considered a serial killer?" Raikou asked in confusion. Lavi nodded, examining him.

"Yeah. Typically it's a killer that has killed 3 or more victims, with a time gap between the murders. It looks like this guy did 2 in one night, though. And…there's a bunch of other stuff I'd rather not say because…" Lavi explained. "Who are you? I know Rei and Kat, but you're a new face."

"Ikazuchi Raikou, I'm in Rei's Crim and ForenSci courses." he supplied helpfully. Lavi got a knowing smile on his face.

"I'm Lavi Bookman, secondary head of the lab department. I should probably warn you though, that Yuu doesn't show it but he's rather protective of Rei when it comes to guys," he said cheerfully, and Rei paled at the name used to refer to her brother. _Explosion in 1, 2, 3._

"Idiotic rabbit! What did I say about my first name?" Kanda's voice yelled from his office.

"Saw that coming. And finish explaining about serial killers, could you?" Rei asked. "Raikou deserves that _wonderful_ lecture on the definition of a serial killer," she said as she and Kat slowly backed away towards the doors. _I still am traumatized from that lecture, s_he thought, recalling the memories of the speech when she had been 15.

"A serial killer is classified into two categories, organized and disorganized. Organized serial killers are ones like Ted Bundy, who would use things to lure a target into his control zone, like wearing a cast on his arm and asking someone to help him put groceries in his car, and then knocking them out with blunt force trauma. They plan out murders, stake out the victims, and have control over where they kill the victim. Also, they'll act like a normal, sane person with many having a spouse and children. They're the person that everyone has a hard time believing was really the serial killer. Most serial killer women are organized. Also, they have a rather high IQ, around 113." Lavi began. Rei and Kat had fled to the car while Raikou was rooted in front of the eccentric lab tech, unable to move due to his imagination and Lavi's ability in describing things.

"Then you've got the disorganized serial killers, average IQs around 93.5, such as the infamous Vampire of Sacramento, Richard Chase. He was actually in the asylum for a few years. Want to know how he got his name?" Raikou shook his head, petrified, but Lavi ignored it and went on. "He sucked his victims' blood, practiced necrophilia, and drank animal blood. One time, he killed a cow, drank the blood, and when a scared little girl saw him smeared with blood, the police found a bucket full of the cow's blood in the trunk of his car. And I swear, the guy was like an animal, he'd urinate and defecate on walls of his asylum room and his victims' homes. Oh, and these crimes are usually crimes of passion. Either that or the bloke's insane, schizo, or demented. And there's more!" Lavi elaborated.

"How do you know all of this?" Raikou stammered, wishing he had fled to the car with the girls. Lavi just offered him a wide grin.

"My grandfather was a historian, and he specialized in crime history. Whenever I complained about being bored he shoved me in the library and had me read a bunch of stuff," the cheeky 32-year-old replied. "Anyway, want to know anything else about these messed-up individuals? Oh, one guy claimed that his neighbor's dog was transmitting him messages from a divine being to kill his victims." Raikou started edging away towards the doors.

"I…better go now before Rei drives off." the poor teen said, running towards the car in panic. "My head…I'm traumatized." he whimpered in the backseat a while later, shivering.

"Now we're on the same level." Rei retorted. "I dealt with that when I was _fifteen_." Kat nodded as well, cracking another hazelnut and making Raikou flinch at the gunshot-like sound. "Oh, man up. We're here. I see Allen and Lenalee now. Hi guys!"

The duo was standing in front of the zoo, quietly conversing on the other side of the police cordon that had plenty of complaints from tourists that wanted to enter the zoo. The yellow tape was already in place, but people were flocking in front of the zoo, pushing to try to get through. It took Allen coming up and flashing his Black Order Investigation insignia to get their attention.

"Everyone, please, listen up!" he tried politely after breaking away from the conversation he had been holding with Lenalee, who was going inside. When he didn't get the desired attention, someone handed the irate man a bullhorn. "Listen up!" the crowd quieted significantly at his roar. "This is a crime scene. Someone has been murdered. Please go on with your ordinary lives and let the Black Order do our job!" In a few minutes, the grumbling citizens dispersed, most mumbling about how inefficient the police force was. Allen rubbed his face in exasperation.

"Hi, Allen." Rei greeted, wincing at the dark expression he wore. Allen perked up, seeing a familiar face.

"Why are you here, Rei?" Allen asked, eyeing the two behind the girl that slightly irked him due to being taller.

"I thought my brother told you. We're the new interns that are part of that program Komui decided to make," she explained. "You remember Kat, right? And this is Raikou. We all go to Cal State Long Beach."

"BaKanda didn't say a thing." Allen replied, quickly losing his cool at the new information. "You're supposed to help us with this case?"

"Yeah." Rei said nervously, "All of us." She swore that there was a loud crack as Allen Walker's reason snapped.

"…Don't do anything stupid, okay?" he snapped, making the trio nod rapidly to appease him. He spun on his heel, and the other three followed in the zoo. "Victim's name was Hitoshirezu Mizu. Japanese, blue dyed hair, blue eyes, 5' 4'', and was a zookeeper here. Not anymore." Allen informed them as he walked down the paths. "She's fish food now," he said ominously as he opened the door to the aquarium. Kat almost dropped the nutcracker she had been swinging around, hands going to cover her mouth and eyes widening. Raikou flinched at the sight of the dead body, and Ryuukei walked up to Lenalee, who was examining the corpse.

"Knocked out with a garrote, and then taken here and drowned." Lenalee said tersely, examining the line in the victim's neck and the bloated state of the body. Rei stepped back from the stench. "Probably been in there for at least 4 hours."

"Oh the irony." Raikou muttered to Kat. "Hitoshirezu Mizu literally translates to "hidden water" in Japanese." Allen perked his ear.

"What? Say that again. It could be connected." Allen snapped, making Raikou back up.

"Hidden water." the younger man said nervously, shocked by the change in Allen's demeanor.

"Lenalee, how was the body found?" the investigator asked. Lenalee straightened up, consulting the papers.

"Hidden in the water flow tanks, and then a while later it managed to flow out to this penguin exhibit. What alerted us was the fire that was set off about 4 hours ago. It was confined to the storage rooms." she said.

"Any zookeepers around?" Allen asked quickly. She shook her head.

"A few, but they all have solid alibis on camera. Furthermore, Mizu's shift was at 12, which would start around now. She was probably taken here and murdered. We found a discarded zookeeper's uniform in the storage room as well, but it's too badly charred to get anything off of it. The culprit knew the zoo by the back of his or her hand, though, since Mizu does not show up on any security cameras." Lenalee explained.

"Do we have access to the footage?" Rei injected hurriedly. "Mizu was probably easily recognized by other staff by her hair, so they could've just jammed a hat or wig on her, right?"

"Nope. No matter how good a wig is, there will be traces," the pathologist replied. "Any other ideas?"

"Gigantic bag?" Kat suggested. "Like a duffel or something maybe?"

"That wouldn't work either."

"Sutures," Raikou said with a horrified expression. "Kat's idea, it would have worked if they cut her up, right?" he whispered. Lenalee knelt down next to Mizu's corpse again, noticing the haphazard stitches attaching the appendages to her body that the intern had noticed.

"This color…they intentionally wanted us to see them." she muttered. "I didn't notice earlier, I just came in a minute or two before you four did, and the black thread goes with the black shirt she is wearing."

"So they smuggled in the corpse, sewed it back up, and then dumped her in the tanks. But why?" Allen asked.

"To disguise that she was killed with the garrote, Allen." Lenalee said softly. "And by immersing the corpse in water, they obliterated any fingerprints or trace evidences that could've been left. If we run a scan, her windpipe is most likely broken, and this jugular vein has been cut through. Murder weapon was probably piano wire or some similar cord. And also…how did they make the body appear to be whole, when these stitches are so far apart?"

"An adhesive using blood." Allen said. "Even if she was in the water for only four hours, she was probably killed before Miranda. Maybe even a day or two before. By hardening her blood between the stitches, they created an adhesive that wouldn't get liquefied by the water. The gaps was probably coated with the adhesive immediately after death, and the culprit wet it here, sewed up Mizu, and left her to be found later. We're dealing with a very organized killer. Also, putting the corpse in the water messed up rigor mortis." Raikou shuddered, remembering the things he had just learned a little while earlier.

"So you're going to be doing her autopsy, Lenalee?" Kat asked, and the pathologist nodded, standing up.

"Yes. Allen, I've noted that livor mortis is indicating that the blood settled when the body was lying on the left side." Lenalee said. "But certain parts of the body surrounding the left side is splotchy, indicating that the body was moved several times before livor mortis could fully set in." Allen nodded rapidly.

"Okay. Well, how about you and Kat go back to the Order to do the autopsy. I remember when we first met that you wanted to go into forensic pathology. And Rei and Raikou will go with me to the remains of Timekeeper. I went through those files that BaKanda gave me and…we should just go back to the scene." he said decisively. "Lenalee and I came in her car, so I guess that you two will take me to Timekeeper. And no, I am never driving in a squad car again." Allen said to the mouthed phrases of "police car" that Raikou and Ryuukei had traded. Raikou shrugged.

"Then can you pay for the gas?" Rei replied with a blank face. Allen made a face, breaking a little of the tension in the air. "So wait, what's Timekeeper?"

"A clock shop turned into a murder and arson scene. What I'm really starting to get curious though…is how the fires started? Daisya didn't tell us any details in his report." Allen explained. Now it was Lenalee's turn to make a wry expression.

"I guess we'll have to figure that key out ourselves," she muttered, leaving the exhibit with the team carrying the corpse, Kat tagging behind. Frowning, Allen gestured to the interns he was left with to lead the way.

"At least you're not like your brother," Allen quipped sharply to Rei, who just buried her face in her hands, muttering death threats at Kanda the whole car trip.

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><p><strong>Exile: And there's Lavi and victim number two, Mizu! I do own her, bless her poor murdered corpse. Oh, I love Overprotective!Kanda, it's just as awesome as Overprotective!Cross. But neither will have a chance to really appear in this fic. I got traumatized on researching on Crim, Criminology for short.<strong>

**Serial killers are scary *wail* I was so badly traumatized after researching that all I read for 2 days STRAIGHT was Yullen doujinshi to heal that mental scar. I still think it's traumatizing. *whimper***

**Review? **


	3. 2: Time Record

**Exile: Well hello again ^. ^ In this chapter there's going to be a lot of technical jargon, so please bear with it. If there's any mistakes, PM me.**

**I don't own anything except my OCs and the plotline. And of course I don't own LA XD**

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><p><span>Chapter Two: Time Record<span>

**5:34 PM November 16****th****, 2012  
><strong>_**The Timekeeper**_**, Los Angeles, CA**

The remains of _The Timekeeper_, Miranda Lotto's clockwork shop, were still colored an eerie ash by the charred wood and warped metals inside the yellow tape. _The Timekeeper_ was in the oldest part of Los Angeles and had not yet been renovated to be fire-resistant. The roof of the building had completely collapsed, and the rafters were no more than slivers of blackened wood. There were still all four walls of the store, but the decades-old brick and mortar had been affected by the fire as well, giving the place the look of a half-hearted construction job that had been snowed over with ashes. The inner walls of the store which had probably separated the workroom and the selling area was burnt down, having been made of thin drywall, and this allowed the investigator and the interns to see that spot where Miranda was most likely killed: an arrangement of grandfather clocks, all piled on the same area. "Hi, Daisya." Allen said, greeting the arson investigator, Daisya Barry.

"Nice to see you again, Allen. Wait, what am I saying? When two investigators meet, it means something bad is happening." Daisya replied dryly. "I haven't been able to do any soccer in days. But why'd Kanda tell me to come over here to meet you?" Allen opened his mouth to answer, but then nudged Rei and Raikou.

"These are the new interns, Ryuukei and Ikazuchi Raikou." Allen introduced. "Remember Kanda's little sister?" Daisya's mouth dropped a bit. "Don't worry, she's nothing like BaKanda. I just met Raikou today. They're not in the office doing paperwork because Kanda decided to torment me."Allen growled. "Anyway, we need you to tell us how the body was. Lenalee and the third intern are at the morgue at the moment, preparing to do an autopsy of the latest victim." Daisya winced.

"So it's another arsonist and murderer. Let's hope a third body doesn't turn up. If so, then Kanda gets permission to join the investigation." Daisya sighed. "Anyway, what do you need to know?"

"How was the body found, what the circumstances of the fire were, and any witness testimonies." Allen explained, checking off his fingers. "So what do you know?"

Daisya frowned at the questions, the tattooed triangles on his face making him look like a smiling clown. "Unfortunately, we have very few witnesses. The fire broke out around 11 PM last night. The zoo went ablaze at 8 AM in the morning. One witness actually is some homeless guy. Apparently Ms. Lotto would give him some money to buy food every now and then. He was going to drop by…"

"But then isn't he a suspect?" Allen interrupted. Daisya shook his head.

"Nope. He's completely clean. Unless poverty is a crime, no criminal record. The neighboring storekeepers knew the guy as someone that would do odd jobs for a bit of money. Good reputation."

"But that doesn't get him off the hook."

"We have solid camera evidence that he was in a neighboring café across the street at least half an hour until after the fire broke out. He was in the shop, facing _The Timekeeper_, and he was the one that yelled at the cashier to call the fire department." Daisya responded.

"He…yelled at the cashier?" Rei interjected. Daisya gave her an odd look, and she winced. "Sorry. But if he was frantic enough when he noticed that the clock shop was on fire, he yelled at them, than he probably wasn't the criminal. I take Psychology."

"Acting skills." Raikou shot back.

"It's sort of easier to tell if someone's acting when an emergency occurs- you know what, let's just look at that camera footage." Rei snarled. Allen's hands descended on both of their heads, and they halted the argument, feeling the annoyance their senior had.

"We were going to get to that. So if you two would please _shut up_, we'll get to hear Daisya explain a bit for us. So what did the techies pick up?" Allen said warningly, directing the last bit Daisya.

"Come on in. Be careful." Daisya said, ducking under the yellow tape that had been left around the perimeter and slowly picking his way through the ashes, splinters, and shattered glass. "At around 9:00, apparently Ms. Lotto had workers come in to do replacement for her lighting system, which I have to admit, could have used some improvements. The front office had standard fluorescent lights, but the backroom, where she did most of the repairs, was mostly a bunch of scattered lamps with different types of light bulbs, and most of them were the old, low-efficacy incandescent ones. A neighbor says that Miranda wanted to upgrade her lighting system because her eyesight was deteriorating. The workers, or should I say, worker, was seen carrying a toolbox, a long rectangular box that we are assuming held fluorescent rods based on the size people described, and was dressed in electrician's uniform. He or she is our prime suspect for the murder, as people also remember seeing them move around the clocks. However, even if he or she did move the clocks in the way that caused them to collapse on Miranda, they left well before 11, the estimated time of the fire's start."

By this time, the group had reached the death scene, the clocks having been moved around slightly from the photo that Allen had seen just that morning, because the team had had to remove the body. Pointing at what appeared to be upside down V-shaped marks, "This is where the main part of the fire started. The smoke at a fire's start, if it is near a wall, tends to make this pattern on the wall. As you can see we're in what was the backroom. She was killed in the front, but the fire started in the back. We've got a few pieces of broken glass, a splintered, old pendulum clock, a weird lamp, and traces of an accelerant in the 2-foot radius around the fire's start, which is surprising since most people that have gone in the backroom claim that this corner was usually rather cluttered." Daisya explained this while pointing at every object, except the glass, which had probably been picked up by the technicians. "Any questions?"

"What was the glass from?" Allen asked, surveying the charred area. "I don't see any indication that there was a window here."

"I think that they were from a light bulb. There were dark, burnt pieces of glass as well. Most of the lamps here were either metal and got warped in the fire, or got burnt up because they were wooden. The light bulbs themselves are fine. Structural fires don't tend to hit the temperature that the glass is going to melt." Daisya explicated. "I don't know for sure, you've got to ask Lavi. He's the technician in charge of all the technicalities." Allen face palmed.

"Daisya, for the last time, your puns suck." Allen griped. "I don't know how many times Kanda told you to shut up with the lame jokes." Rei and Raikou exchanged glances. "And Lavi is not a freaking lab technician. He's our evidence analyzer and general test-runner."

"Do we want to know?" Rei asked hesitantly. Allen shook his head. "Okay. So what are we here for?"

"I don't know. This is actual fieldwork, you two. Crime shows dramatize the whole thing. There's no such thing as a "forensic investigator", cos' that is basically a whole bunch of jobs lumped together. The most people we'll have the day after the crime is some police to make sure no one tries to touch anything and the investigator. Can we get a copy of the surveillance camera footage, Daisya?" Allen said rapidly. He nodded.

"Sure, you'll probably get it tomorrow at soonest. Oh, yeah, you better ask Lavi the results of the GC-MS. I've got to go back to the Order to check in with Kanda about getting a shift change." Daisya muttered. "That dang idiot purposely gave me the night shift."

Allen shrugged. "Eh, well it's probably because you're dependable enough to take the shift with the most incidents. You two, any questions?" he asked Rei and Raikou.

The two exchanged glances before blurting out, "What's a GC-MS?" Allen and Daisya looked at each other with pained expressions.

"Ask Lavi. Now let's go back to the morgue." Allen replied hurriedly. "I seriously don't want to get into the details. Besides, Lavi is the carrier of all random information when it comes to the fine points. Rei, you of all people should know the extent of his knowledge." Her demeanor darkened at she recalled every single time Lavi had ruined her already not-so-intact sanity. "So bother him instead. Just make sure to do it on his break. So Daisya, mind telling us where that witness is at the moment?"

**7:01 PM November 16****th****, 2012  
>Black Order Morgue, Los Angeles, CA<strong>

When Lenalee and Ekaterina finally emerged from the autopsy, Kat was both weary and wanting to vomit, whereas Lenalee just looked at her new protégé with amusement. "I'm assuming that you don't go to horror movies?" the older woman joked, and Kat ran to the water bottles, trying to swallow the bile that had risen in her throat. "Don't worry. It's not like that was a live person. Corpses are not going to rise up and sue us for murder by autopsy. You'll live."

_No wonder lab techs warned me that she was frightening during autopsies. _Kat thought as she gagged at the memory. The moment Lenalee Lee had stepped into the autopsy room, a whole 180 degree personality change happened. To say that Lenalee was…efficient with the autopsies was an understatement. She was an absolute professional, completing the autopsy within an hour with precise cuts and a shocking speed of observation. "Scary, huh?" Kat dimly heard the voice of her cousin Lavi say. "Kat? Lenalee, is she alive?"

"She should be. The autopsy actually went a little faster with Mizu being disassembled and all. But I suppose that she has no stomach." Lenalee's voice registered in her mind.

"The corpse had no stomach?" Lavi asked with shock.

"No. Your cousin, I mean. I'm trying to organize my observations in my head so I can write up that medical report. I guess I went a bit overboard with things and forgot to explain some stuff to her." Lenalee called back.

"A BIT overboard? That was more terrifying than watching _Higurashi: When They Cry_ with Rei!_" _Kat cried, making Lavi start at the sudden outburst. "And Rei by herself is scary enough! _Higurashi_ is absolutely frightening! But Lenalee with a scalpel is even worse!" she told her cousin, who winced.

"Well, that's Lena's serious side showing. Well, her ultra-serious side that will throw a knife at you if you bother her." Lavi explained with a grimace. "That's why Kanda tries to lock himself in his office with a good excuse every now and then so Lenalee won't bother him right after she does an autopsy. She only reverts back to her usual self after she writes up the medical report. And that medical report usually takes a few hours for her."

"No, I'm going to get some dinner first. I can't live on coffee and autopsies alone, Lavi." Lenalee interrupted in passing, taking off the lab coat and striding out the doors of the break room. "Tell Allen that I'll see him after I get some food. Ah, well nevermind." The door opened to reveal a haggard investigator and two equally fatigued interns. "Hi, Allen. What did Daisya say?"

"He said a lot of stuff." Raikou replied vaguely, sparing Allen from answering. "And we're hungry." Lavi's one eye widened as he saw Lenalee tie her hair back to her two pigtails, a sign that she back to "normal".

"Well that was fast." he muttered. "And really weird. She hasn't even touched the paperwork yet." He had, as Lavi would put it, a curious and helpful personality. Those around him, namely Kanda and Allen, would bluntly say that Lavi was trying at best and downright prying at worst. And the downright prying part applied especially to relationships. "Oi, Rei, do you think that Lenalee is interested in beansprout?" Lavi asked with a smirk, sliding behind Rei who simply decided it would be best to follow her brother's advice and ignore the eyepatch-wearing man.

"Why ask me?" she said bluntly. "And if you start up the rumor mill again, you know that Kanda's going to give you an extra workload. Or hunt you down with a katana."

"But that's no fun!" Lavi complained insistently. Rei gritted her teeth and elbowed the cheeky redhead.

"Lavi. Even though I'm younger than you, as your boss's little sister, I would recommend shutting up before I tell Brother that if you have enough free time to hypothesize relationships and love triangles, you have enough time to finish all those GC-MS tests from the fires." Rei growled, already annoyed by Lavi. Suddenly, she remembered the conversation between Allen and Daisya. "One sec, what's a GC-MS test in the first place?"

Lavi stopped rubbing his stomach where Rei had elbowed him and frowned. "A GC-MS? I thought you'd know something like that, dear Holder of All Random Knowledge."

"That's your title, not mine." Rei snapped. "Tell me please. I hate not knowing."

"A GC-MS, idiot, is a gas chromatograph mass spectrometer." Kanda explained, appearing out of seemingly nowhere. "You're professor didn't tell you yet?"

"I said don't freaking sneak up on us!" Rei yelled in shock. "And pray, dear brother, what the hell is a gas chromatograph mass spectrometer?"

"I'll answer that. Yuu should hurry back to your office before Lenalee gives you her medical report verbally…again." Lavi's cheekiness was responded with Kanda throwing a punch towards his face. "C'mon, Yuu! Don't be such an ice block!"

"Shut up and don't call me that! I'm going to kill you!" Kanda roared.

Allen and Lenalee, both who had been watching the proceedings with amusement, turned away and sighed. "Kanda and Lavi have been like this ever since middle school. You'd think that after they graduated university, Kanda would at least stop threatening to kill Lavi every time he's called by his first name." she said resignedly. "And that Lavi would have stopped being such a kid." Allen just shrugged.

"Hey, at least they keep it from being boring around here. But back to business, what did your autopsy reveal?" he asked. Lenalee straightened up and looked at him in the eye.

"The jugular vein was cut through, and Mizu bled to death. I took a sample of the adhesive and gave it to Lavi to test – it didn't look like blood- and there were no other injuries. The dismemberment was postmortem. The effect of the water on the body was significant enough that her skin was majorly pruned. I'm guessing that she was submerged in the water for at least a good 2 hours. All internal organs are present, except part of the respiratory tract. I'm guessing that it was caused when her neck was cut off. I observed a broken wrist and a shattered kneecap. Mizu probably tried to get away and failed, and the assailant broke her wrist and shot the kneecap to prevent any other escape attempts. There was no bullet, and the hole was hidden when the knee was cut off and reattached. The thing is that we don't know where the primary crime scenes are. This guy moved her to a secondary scene, so there's barely any evidence we can collect. No to mention the fire, too." Lenalee informed Allen.

"Why don't you write out your medical report and I'll review it later. I've currently got a…information overload from meeting with Daisya earlier. And not to mention I'm rather hungry." Allen proposed with a wince. As if on cue, a monstrous growl emanated from his stomach, and the investigator went red with embarrassment, making Lenalee laugh. "I'm probably going to grab some fast food, and then go home. Our shifts are almost over. I just seriously hope that the guy doesn't strike a third time. I've got enough problems with this investigation already. And there's Cross." Allen's demeanor darkened as he ran through the likelihood of Cross having a new pile of debts for him to pay when he got back home. "If that man has more debts for me to pay, I'm kicking him out."

"You always say that, Allen. But we all know that you have a small soft spot for your guardian." Lenalee sighed in exasperation. "Anyway, Raikou, Rei, Kat, you guys should be going now. It's almost 8."

"Not until I finish explaining to these deprived interns what some of the testing machines and techniques are!" Lavi yelled back across the room, the three interns in front of him. "Okay, so what did I just tell you what a GC-MS was?"

"A gas chromatographer mass spectrometer is a machine that tests evidence. The gas chromatograph has the evidence inserted into a capillary column, and the properties of the column, which is made various materials, will cause the evidence to separate while travelling down the column due to the separation by the different chemical properties of each molecule. The column holds the molecules and releases them at different times to the MS. The mass spectrometer then observes each molecule by ionizing them and calculating the mass to charge ratio. This test can be used for analyzing things from soil in agriculture to fire debris in arson crime scenes." Kat recited, Rei and Raikou lagging. Lavi activated his "teaching mode" and gave the other two a stink-eye.

"Rei, tell me what the machine used in ballistics comparison is and how it works. And the basics of ballistic fingerprinting." he snapped irately, ever the perfectionist. Said Viet winced and began regurgitating the information.

"The comparison microscope allows a ballistics investigator to lay two bullets next to each other in order to match bullets for ballistic fingerprinting. Ballistics fingerprinting is the set of forensic techniques used to match bullets or guns to the projectile or the firearm left at the crime scene. There is use of aforesaid comparison microscope, striation contrast, rifling, cartridge markings, and the obvious size differences." Rei wheezed, out of breath at the end of the last phrase.

"Raikou, what's livor mortis?" the lab supervisor asked.

"Livor mortis is a condition in which the blood in the corpse settles to the lower portion of the body. When the red blood cells are no longer influenced by the heart's beat, gravity pulls the blood cells down. Livor mortis is used by pathologists to determine the position of the body in death, and full lividity happens within 6 to 12 hours of death. Each cadaver is different, so livor mortis is only used to roughly estimate time of death." Raikou explained.

"Fine. Good. You guys pass. However, if one of you three decides that you'd rather work in the lab than the bloody crime scene or the autopsy room, than ask Yuu to transfer you to my department. Trust me, it is fun." Lavi said cheerfully. Kat nodded vigorously, still perturbed by her experience with Lenalee.

"Okay, we're going to go now, then." Rei said, bowing respectfully.

"You gentleman." Kat muttered, earning a psychotic smile from Rei that made Raikou step back in fear. "It's true. If only you were born with a Y chromosome…"

"Disturbing much?"Raikou asked Kanda shakily. "I mean, why is your little sister mistaken as a guy at school so much? I've seen girls crying because of…her."

"…Blame Tiedoll for wanting another son." Kanda muttered under his breath. "And for not realizing that she was a girl when we first met."

"Oh, Brother, when is our next shift?" Rei asked quickly. Her being mistaken for a boy was not a pleasant subject for her. Suddenly, Kanda's mouth formed the characteristic slasher smile that they had in common.

"You guys will be working with beansprout and Lenalee on this case. So I expect to see you guys every day until this thing is solved. No complaints, because Komui said that I have free reign with the intern program here." Everyone's jaw dropped in horror at the news while Kanda walked off. "So the sooner you find the guy, the sooner you have a break."

"…freaking frag grenades." Rei muttered, Allen giving her a sidelong glance.

"You have no right to complain, Rei. Apparently sadism runs in your household." he said sarcastically.

"Tell me about it." Lavi frowned. "If Yuu is like that, then I don't want to know what Rei is when she's sadistic."

"WHAT DID I SAY ABOUT CALLING ME THAT?" Kanda's voice roared from down the hallway.

* * *

><p><strong>Exile: Okay, well supposing that you survived the jargon...<strong>

**Review? I need critique, especially since I'm turning this in for a grade O. O**


	4. 3: Song of Maria

**Exile: I don't own. And thank you for all the reviews!**

**And please give a round of applause for Fou and her awesomeness.**

Song of Maria

**10:20 PM, November 16****th****, 2012  
>Allen Walker's home, Santa Monica, CA<strong>

The loud noise of a rickety house blasting an old opera song filled the noise of a small neighborhood in Santa Monica. The stray dog that habitually slept near said house perked up its ears in alarm at the loud gunshot that followed, and then wisely scrambled to its feet and fled as the smell of smoke reached its nose. A shadowy figure escaped from the back door of the house, and the person ran past the dog and faded into the darkness.

Allen had finished dinner and had finally driven home to face the inevitable mountain of debts that came with the cost of Cross as his guardian. The moment he stepped into the door the investigator noticed that Cross's favorite opera song was playing on the record player, "Carte Garde" by Maria, which was odd because the "red-haired bastard" remembered bad memories whenever it played. Wary and cautious, Allen strode over to the record player and shut it off, ducking from the wine bottle that was usually thrown at his head whenever the music was shut off. To his surprise, no wine or beer bottle went flying at his head and no former sniper stood at the kitchen door with a pile of bills awaiting Allen. Getting more nervous at the oddity, Allen slowly opened the kitchen door and his eyes widened at what was lying on a chair and the raging fire three inches from said door.

A minute later a frantic call was recorded by an operator. "My name is Allen Walker, and my house is on fire and there's a corpse in there! I live in Santa Monica…" Allen spieled off his address to the person, then hung up and dialed the Black Order.

"I need Kanda Yuu, Lenalee Lee, and Lavi Bookman. It's Allen Walker, code Edge End. I need the arson team _right now_," he said to the synthesized voice recorder. It recognized the used words and identical messages were fired off to the named people.

_Allen Walker, Edge End status. Arson team needed._ Lavi read off his screen. Switching windows, he dialed the number of the second arson investigator and ran off to his car. Lenalee read the same message, and she dropped the pen she had been writing with to answer to the alert. When Kanda saw the words "Edge End", he lunged across his desk and dropped the sheaf of files he had been holding. An errant file floated down from the desk, and there were a set of related names listed.

_Miranda Lotto…Hitoshirezu Mizu…Cross Marian…Kanda Yuu…Froi Tiedoll…_ were the words that his secretary registered as she picked it up and re-filed the page.

It took the fire deputies five minutes to get to the old house and charge in to extinguish the flames that had been contained in the living room and kitchen. Lenalee, Kanda, and Lavi had arrived not three minutes later, and when they got to the scene, Allen was being questioned by the LAPD. "So, sir, what were you doing at the time of the fire?" a policeman asked him with a notepad in hand. Allen sighed and slumped to sit at the curb.

"Sir, I told the operator that it was only necessary for to fire department. When my colleagues get here, the body will be taken care of." Allen replied, making the trio flinch at the oddly polite yet devoid of emotion tone that Allen was using, the one that meant that something was horribly wrong.

The policeman's eyes narrowed, "I'm sorry sir, but as you were first to discover the body, that puts you as the person of interest for this case. So I'm assuming you were going to get your colleagues to help you dispose of the body?" he asked sarcastically. "What do you and your associates do?" the man suddenly jumped at the hand on his shoulder, and he was spun around to face one irate Kanda and an equally pissed off Lenalee and Lavi.

"Allen Walker is an investigator for the Los Angeles branch of the Black Order Morgue. I'm his superior and the two behind me are also involved with this case. The LAPD is not needed here, and because since he is an employee of the Order this is our case." Kanda all but hissed. "If you had actually let the stupid beansprout speak, he would have told you that. Here's our identification." Kanda rummaged around his pocket and flipped out his ID that identified him as the Branch Head of Los Angeles, complete with the overt Rose Cross that was the insignia of the Order. The policeman stepped back and ground his teeth, not knowing what he was supposed to do when confronted with one of the Order on a crime scene. The Order had a record in the police force as being the elite of elites: lab scientists with photographic memory, pathologists with astonishing perception, investigators that could _look_ at a crime scene and find the trace of the criminal that would lead to arrest, and eccentric Branch Heads that could easily beat you in a battle of wits or take down multiple armed men in a matter of minutes. It was a mute general rule in the police to not butt heads with the Order or the Order's employees, as whoever did would end up absolutely depressed, feeling idiotic, or defeated by the encounter, depending on who they met. "So are you going to call off your men? Our arson investigator and techs are coming right now."

The policeman pulled one of his coworkers aside and they conducted a hurried conversation on the proper procedure for these instances. Lenalee and Lavi took advantage of this to rush Allen's side. "What happened? Where's Cross? Who was the body?" Lenalee asked rapidly. Allen looked up with empty, despondent eyes.

"Cross…Cross was killed," he said hoarsely, "I saw…a bullet through the head, stomach, and chest, and there were empty wine bottles lined up in a row right in front of the door. Cross was sitting on a chair, and he was tied to it. H-He's _dead_, guys…he's dead. He can't die; it's impossible!" Allen ranted, obviously in a bad state of shock. "And the thing that I find the worst bit is that the accelerant was his wines and champagnes. So he did die of alcohol!" at the last phrase, Allen laughed in a deranged manner. Meanwhile, the police had reached a decision to leave people there until the Order's forces showed up, much to Kanda's amusement. In less than a minute, the second arson investigator, as well as Lavi's "underlings" as Lavi liked to refer to them, had arrived on the scene.

"Kanda, what's going on?" Timothy Hearst asked with an edge of curiosity the moment he stepped out of the car. "It takes a lot to make Allen go off like that. I think the last time was four years ago when Neah was killed." Timothy Hearst was probably the youngest investigator to be accepted into the Order, only being 28 at the moment. He was a genius like Lavi, but sadly a mastermind with the humor of a 5-year-old and the playful mentality of Lavi on a sugar high.

"Oi, beansprout, since it's your house all we need is your permission to go in and investigate instead of the standard warrant." Kanda said to Allen, ignoring Timothy. "So what is it?"

"Just get me a glass of water and I'll give you guys the grand tour." Allen retorted with his usual sharpness that only happened when dealing with Kanda. A water bottle was thrown at his face, and Allen caught it and quickly downed the contents. "Cross… Cross was killed by 3 bullets to the brain, heart, and stomach respectively. Wait; get me a piece of paper." Lenalee ripped out a piece of notepad and gave it to Allen, and he began quickly sketching what he remembered about the body. "Body…was sitting on a chair. Wine bottles were…uncorked and lining the room. A record player was playing in the entryway, but I turned it off the moment I went in. He was tied to the chair as well…and there were bloodstains on the tile floor in front of the chair." When Allen had finished his rough sketch of the death scene, he passed it up to Lavi to hold on to. "I feel better now. Let's g-go in." he stood up, but staggered and landed on the grass.

"Your body is still experiencing the shock, Allen. Wait a bit more until your nerves are steady. Since you gave permission, we four will go in to check on the house." Lenalee said softly, and Allen nodded in agreement. "Okay, then we'll see you." With that she, Kanda, Lavi, and Timothy ran up the steps and into the entry hall.

Lavi was holding onto the sketch and poking around the hall. "Well, here's the record player beansprout mentioned. Geez, this record is old- at least 50 years. It was probably been playing for only a few minutes before Allen went in, judging by the heat and the position of the scratcher." Lenalee nodded, stealing a peek at the drawing.

"Why do you think that the wine bottles are lining the kitchen?" she asked.

"Alcohol. Accelerant. Trap." Kanda explained shortly. "Let's open the door right now." With that he strode over to what was presumed to be the kitchen door. Kanda stared at the doorframe for a few seconds. "This door opens inwards." Opening it, he stepped back with a snarl at the sight of the stiff corpse of Cross Marian. When he opened the door further, the trio heard the clatter of glass falling on tile, and from the corner of the room, a pool of wine raced towards the space underneath the chair of the cadaver, where the tile was burnt and there were several ashes and charred objects, the most obvious being a burnt match. "The perp decided to leave a nice trap for whoever discovered Cross if they found him before the house became a fireball. I'm guessing that there was a fire under him and another in the living room. As we saw, when I opened the door, the wine bottles fell, spilling out the alcohol. They're all directed to the center of the room, where the fire was. When the wine reached the flames, it would send the flames in the direction of the person, and the wider they opened the door, the more likely they would turn into roast human. I'm guessing that it was a habit for beansprout to open the door slowly, because of Cross's character the guy probably would throw stuff at the beansprout, and so that's why he's still alive."

"The bullet to the stomach happened first, judging by bloodstains, in order to deliver excruciating pain to Cross. And then instead of actually shooting the heart the right side of the chest was shot, puncturing the lungs and making blood flow into the lungs, slowly drowning him in his own body fluids. And afterwards, the killing shot was delivered to the brain, and Marian died immediately," Lenalee observed, picking her way over the wine bottles and the ashes to the center of the kitchen.

"Yeah, this is definitely the work of the same guy," Lavi said, popping back from where he had disappeared into the living room to search for evidence. "The same glass shards in the living room are similar to the ones from other crime scenes. But what's got me confuzzled is the connection between Cross, Miranda, and Mizu."

"Confuzzled? Really, Lavi?" Timothy asked, eyes lighting up. "That's an awesome word!" Lenalee sighed in exasperation, hitting both their backs.

"No going off on random tangents, guys." she scolded, Kanda grunting in agreement. "But the connection has been bugging me as well. I mean, the connection is floating somewhere around in the back of my head, but…"

Kanda was now recalling what he had been reading less than an hour ago: the old DGM case files. "Cross…Mizu…Miranda…" his head jerked up from his thinking stance as he strode out the house and to where Allen was muttering to himself on the curbside. "Beansprout! Where was Cross on December 14th four years ago?" he barked. Allen lifted up his head in surprise and shock.

"He said that he was going out to do some work." Allen replied cautiously.

"What was his job?" Kanda asked insistently.

"I-I don't know!" Allen cried. "All I know that he was a sniper for something. That's it!"

"Get in here!" Kanda hissed, easily dragging Allen up into the house. "Lavi, Lenalee, Cross was involved in my first case. So were Miranda and Mizu; that's the connection. There can't be any other!"

"The DGM case?" Lavi yelped. "Are you serious? Wait…Cross is a sniper, Earl was killed by a snipe shot to the heart- it makes sense! But what about Mizu and Miranda?"

"They're connected some way, I'm sure of it. I remember seeing their names in the files before. We'll need to go back to the Order. You guys stay here and take care of the body and comb the house for evidence. We're going to do some paperwork sorting." Kanda ordered, keeping a vice grip on Allen and getting in his car. "Get in, beansprout. In this state there's no way I'm letting you drive by yourself." Allen silently complied after fetching some items from his car.

* * *

><p><strong>11:32 PM November 16<strong>**th****, 2012  
>Black Order Morgue, Los Angeles Branch<strong>

"What are Kanda and Allen doing here so late?" Fou growled to Sachiko, Kanda's secretary. "I made sure to get the night and early morning shift so I wouldn't have to deal with that ice block."

"I have no idea." Sachiko replied worriedly. "Kanda just called me here to help locate some old closed files. And yes, Fou, I'm going to get paid overtime." The red-haired woman went back to searching for files related to the D. Gray-Man case like Kanda had instructed her, stacking each one near the door, and Allen's hand would snake out every few seconds and hasty sounds of pages turning would follow.

"What does he want with the DGM case files?" Fou asked confusedly, picking up one of the folders that Kanda had tossed out of his office. Sachiko shrugged.

"All he said when I came in was that he needed the task files for it. Something about a connection with some serial murders." she replied.

"Fantastic. Well, at least Lenalee's taking this case." Fou muttered, walking off with a fresh batch of paperwork on her next autopsy. A triumphant yell suddenly came from inside Kanda's office, and Allen poked his head out.

"Chomesuke, we're good now." Allen said hurriedly to Sachiko, referring to her by her nickname. The door to the office slammed shut again. Inside, she could hear a rapid discussion between the two. Sighing, Sachiko wisely decided to just go home and get her beauty sleep.

"I knew it." Kanda pointed out, jabbing at the names on the task list. "Cross was the sniper that day. Mizu was the officer that led the chase for the Earl, and Miranda was an important informant for the bodies. They're all connected. And now we know who the next victims could be." Allen suddenly paled.

"Yeah, but there are several people involved with the case…and you were the name that popped up the most when attributing the case solution." Kanda glared at Allen after hearing the statement.

"I doubt it. If the perpetrator killed me, the connection would be noticed right away. What I'm worried about is that we know a lot of the next prospective victims." the Japanese man explained. "And Tiedoll is on the list. And Rei. And a whole bunch of people." Allen furrowed his eyebrows in confusion.

"Rei? Why her?"

"She ran some stuff to some people. And I gave her some of the coded messages left at crime scenes to play with," Kanda responded vaguely, "but which idiot would put a basic courier on the task list?"

"Woah. One second, you tricked Rei into delivering information?" Allen asked in astonishment. "What type of brother are you?"

"Shut up, beansprout. I needed someone that could defend themselves, not be too conspicuous or easily memorable, and someone that I trusted. Ryuukei just filled the criteria for me." Kanda snapped. Suddenly, Lavi rudely kicked the door open, a grim frown replacing his usual cheery grin.

"We're here. Allen, do you want to see Cross before Lenalee does the autopsy?" he asked grimly. Allen bit his lip to prevent tears from flowing. Sure, Cross had been horrible as his guardian, but Allen could name several occasions which Cross actually had pulled through for him. Kanda's eye twitched and he shoved his employee out the office.

"Go say your condolences. I'm going to contact that idiot sister of mine and warn her." With that the door was closed once again as Allen walked off with Lavi to the body while Kanda turned around and furiously punched in Rei's number to his cell. After a few dial tones, Rei picked up, obviously having been asleep.

"What, Brother?" she asked groggily. "Make it fast; I need to sleep. I've got to go to Tiedoll's in a day for Thanksgiving Break."

"Quiet," Kanda grumbled. "Anyway, I need you to watch out for any suspicious people. You're a likely target."

"Woah, wait, why me?" Rei yelled into the phone, shooting up in her bed. "What did I do? I'm going to kill you if it's because of you!"

"Idiot. The connection is the people who helped out in the DGM case. The ones that weren't publicly announced. And you're one of them." he admitted regretfully. "Remember those codes I asked you to crack when you were hyper? And the stuff I had you deliver?" there was a silence on the other side of the line.

"Goddamnit. You used me as a courier and a decoder?" she cursed, and Kanda could hear the deadly intent in her voice. "And now I'm a prospective target?"

"Well…yeah," he winced.

"I hate you. I may as well go set up some traps now." Rei muttered, hanging up the line and stalking off to her arsenal of various items. "Kat! Get up; we need to set some traps up! Stupid BaKanda's fault."

"Well now, _that_ went well." Lavi remarked as Kanda walked out. "I heard the whole thing. I get the vibe that she's not an early morning person. Anyway, what about Tiedoll? Aren't you going to warn him?"

"San Diego is at least 4 hours away, idiot rabbit. I doubt that he'll be targeted." Kanda snapped. "I'm going to go home now. Update me in the morning."

"I'm going to catch that guy, I swear." Allen vowed darkly as he sat in the employee lounge. It was past midnight, but Lenalee had decided to do Cross's autopsy immediately when she and Lavi had arrived at the morgue. The pathologist was now in the middle of the autopsy, and Allen had been unable to sleep. Lavi was allowing Allen to stay at his place, and was going to drive Allen to his home, seeing as Allen's house was now a crime scene. Unexpectedly, Timothy walked into the lounge and tapped Allen on the shoulder. "What, Tim?"

"I need you to answer some questions about the lighting system of your house." Timothy replied uneasily, "Every single light bulb in gone, except the one in your entry hallway. I think that I have an inkling of how the fire started. It all depends on what you say."

"…Fine. It was a really old house, but we used mostly the new energy-efficient light bulbs. I know that we had some old incandescent ones in some rooms." he answered.

"Bingo." Timothy breathed, eyes dilating. "Want to run some tests with me? Well, more like experiments?" Allen nodded, and then Tim took off to the parking lot, Allen in tow. In the middle was a lamp plugged into an extension cord. The arson investigator produced a match, and turned on the lamp. "Here we have a lamp with an old-style low-efficacy light bulb." He turned it off, and then pulled out a roll of tissue paper and some tape, using it to bind the match right next to the light bulb. "These old bulbs heat up fast, and in about ten minutes the match will go up in flames."

True to what he said, within ten minutes the match suddenly ignited, making Allen jump. It burned through the tissue paper and fell to the asphalt, burning brightly and rapidly. When it died down due to no other fuel, Allen raised an eyebrow. "So? Care to explain?"

"Yeah! You see, the…" Tim opened his mouth to explain the phenomenon before a gunshot was heard.

Lavi jerked his head to look out the window at the ominous sound of a gunshot. As if in slow-motion, he watched Timothy Hearst stagger, blood appearing around his mouth, and collapse in front of Allen. "Beansprout!" Allen jerked to life and made a mad dash towards the entrance of the building. Lavi rushed to the doors and flung them open, slamming them shut the moment Allen had reached the threshold as he saw the sparks of another bullet hit the asphalt. "Fou! Help!" the irritable orange-haired pathologist appeared out of from one of the rooms and ran out of the doors towards the collapsed Timothy, spinning and dodging in midair to avoid more shots.

Scooping up the young man, Fou ran back in, abruptly dumping Tim on a couch whilst Lavi frantically called for the ambulance. Grabbing a pistol from Chomesuke's counter, she dashed back out and returned fire in the direction of the silhouette that bore a shotgun, attempting to make headway to get a good look at the criminal. Gunshots rang and Fou felt a bullet graze her leg, making her stagger backwards. Before she lost her footing, Fou released another round before diving behind some cars. The shady figure smiled evilly, aiming for a car to set off a chain explosion before he felt a rush of air from several bullets fly right past his left ear. Lavi had found a rifle equipped with a scope in the weaponry, had run to the 2nd floor balcony, and was aiming to kill. The person cursed before running off to beat a hasty retreat, still holding onto their pistol.

"Fou! Are you okay?" Lavi yelled worriedly, searching the parking lot for where Fou was hiding. The 36 year old jumped on the roof of her car and shot Lavi thumbs up.

"I'm fine! I just need to bandage my leg!" she hollered back. "Unlock the doors, will you?" Lavi complied, and the moment Fou had wrapped her leg with bandages, the ambulance screamed into the parking lot, and Timothy was escorted out on a stretcher. "How is Tim?"

"He's alive." Allen replied wearily. "The bullet only barely missed his stomach, but he'll be in the ICU for a while." Lavi ground his teeth.

"Darnit! If only Kanda didn't leave yet, we would've caught the guy!" he cursed. "So close!"

"What the hell just happened?" Lenalee asked, running into the room with her scalpel in hand and work gloves on. "I heard the gunshots, but I was in the middle of examining the bullet paths in Cross's body!"

"Timothy was shot, and I barely got in safely. Fou went out to help Tim, and she's in the parking lot right now to pick up the bullets from her gunfight." Allen explained, pointing outside to Fou's silhouette. "We finally have a lead."

"One second! If the bullets that we found in your house match the ones from just now, then we might be closer to nabbing the guy!" Lenalee exclaimed, making Allen and Lavi nod.

"Yeah…" Allen agreed, and suddenly the full rush of the day's stress collided on him. He staggered against the wall and slumped down in weariness. Lenalee's hawk eyes didn't miss a single motion.

"But other than that, you two should go to sleep. You look like the walking dead. And I don't want to do autopsies on either of you." Allen and Lavi shuddered, and the redhead ran to down several cups of coffee so he could stay awake at the wheel while driving him and Allen to his home.

"I'd sooner have another gunfight with a murderer again than talk to Lenalee when she has a scalpel." Fou muttered as they passed her. "Goodnight, you two."

* * *

><p><strong>Exile: Review<strong>?


	5. 4: Divine Wrath

**Exile: I don't own.**

**And I would recommend checking out chapter three again, for edit's sake.**

* * *

><p><span>Chapter Four: Divine Wrath<span>

** 1:01 AM November 17th, 2012  
>Rei and Kat's home, Long Beach, California<strong>

Rei was cursing viciously at Kanda under her breath; she felt all the right to be angry at him. It was his fault for getting her into this mess, and now, here she and Ekaterina were, awake at 1 AM in the morning for the sake of patrolling the house and setting up various traps that could be made with household items. Rei liked to imagine her brother running through the house and setting off God-knows-how-many traps. She would never really strike her brother, so this was probably the most malevolent the Viet would ever be to her brother. Ryuukei snapped out of her reverie at a light tap on her shoulder, jumping up in shock and spinning around wielding a meat cleaver. Kat ducked the deadly arc as the knife whistled right above her head. "You know I hate people sneaking up on me!"

"I'm sorry." Kat muttered, standing back up and confiscating the sharp blade. "If I spoke, you would've thrown it at me before registering my voice. But whenever you're tapped, you always follow the same arc no matter what the weapon is. So it's safer." Rei scowled at the knowledge of her habits; she liked being considered unpredictable to everyone. Hell, Kat had to admit that she didn't know whether Rei was lying half the time. Only Kanda knew, and it wasn't like _he_ had to live with his compulsive liar of a sister. "But anyway, I think that you should go to Tiedoll's today instead of the day after. San Diego is four hours away, and there's virtually no alibi for an eight-hour absence. I think that you'll be safer there." Rei's scowl deepened. "I know you don't like Tiedoll that much, but…"

"I get it," she snapped flatly. "Did you set up the black widows?" When Kat nodded, Rei ran a hand through her hair and turned around to trudge up the stairs to her bedroom. "You be careful too."

"Why?" Kat asked.

"Because the guy might accidentally kill you instead of me, no duh," Rei snapped, "We DO share a house."

At around 9:15 in the morning, when the sun poked its arms into one sorrowful Lenalee Lee's room, the curtains were swung closed with a sharp hiss. Lenalee rubbed her eyes wearily, looking down at the massive amounts of paper littering her desk, most of them covered with nearly undecipherable notes taken from the three crime scenes as well as from the DGM case files. The moment she had arrived home, Lenalee had snatched a sandwich from the refrigerator and tromped upstairs to her room, then dumped the contents of her bag onto her desk and started working, ignoring her brother's call for a talk about whether anyone was hitting on her again. Komui Lee would always be an overprotective brother until the day he died in all of his mad-scientist glory. Lenalee tapped her fingers against the desk anxiously.

"There's something off about this. Something really weird. For one, why are they targeting the people who helped catch the Earl? And why the hell are they…being so erratic? This doesn't make sense," she grumbled. "Normally serial killers settle with only a few methods of death, and stick to something simple like shooting, knifing, or blunt force trauma. But this guy has used blunt force trauma for Miranda, garroting then drowning the corpse for Mizu, and then shooting for Cross. There might be a hint in the task files…" her train of thought was rudely interrupted by the loud jangle of her cell phone. Looking at the number, Lenalee tapped the screen and held up the Android to her ear. "Morning, Kanda. What is it?" she asked. There was a loud crash on the other side of the line as she picked out Kanda's muffled words. "What?"

"I said get to the Order soon!" Kanda hollered and he continued to fend off his attacker. "Some politician wants to meet us!" was all that Lenalee deciphered.

"Who is it? What's going, on, Kanda?" Lenalee yelled back into the phone, worry escalating. There was shouting in the background, and then Kanda deigned to reply.

"Rei hacked my phone and computer, and there's a freaking virus running rampant!" he explained angrily, "And it's that politician Sheryl Kamelot, the one that's been getting a whole lot of good press lately."

"You're kidding me! I just pulled an all-nighter and now you expect me to meet with a _politician?_ Why does this guy want to meet me?" Lenalee retorted, snapping a pencil by accident in her anger. The sounds of rapid typing subsided in the background as Kanda recovered his breath.

"He wants to know about the case that you have," Kanda replied. "The fires _do_ draw attention you know. And the fact that beansprout pulled us on a code Edge End didn't exactly go unnoticed by the police." Lenalee winced.

"Code Edge End; I completely forgot what it meant until yesterday." she murmured, "Komui is probably going to want to pull me off this case now."

"He better not!" Kanda yelled into the phone using her virus, causing Lenalee to cringe at the volume, "If Komui does that, then the paper vultures will circle even more! He can't be overprotective of you forever- oi, what the heck happened to my screen?" Lenalee promptly hung up on what she was guessing was another sibling fight between Kanda and Rei.

"Well, she does have a right to be mad at him, I guess… Now I know why Komui is so addicted to." Lenalee ran downstairs and stole the last few glass bottles of Starbuck's mocha from the refrigerator, downed them, and scrambled to go make herself presentable.

Back in downtown LA, Lavi was discovering the bad side of having Allen as a boarder: his appetite. Already, the younger man had consumed a baguette and 6 eggs, a package of mixed salad, and the remaining tofu in his fridge, which was about 8 ounces. And that was only breakfast. Lavi almost felt ill just watching him eat. "Where does all of that go, beansprout?" he asked curiously. "If you're so short but you eat this much, then what happens?"

"I dunno," Allen replied, tearing off another hunk of baguette as Lavi began contemplating the potential cost of allowing Allen to room for the rest of the week. "Anyway, what time are you going to be going to the Order?"

"After you finish, err… eating?" Lavi bit back what he was going to say, seeing the harsh glint in Allen's eyes. "I'll be right back." he added. After grabbing his car keys, Lavi scrambled out of his apartment downstairs to his car, pulling open his wallet and driving out of the parking lot. Allen watched from upstairs with a mystified expression. "…I really don't want to know that percentage of his paycheck that goes to food…" Lavi bemoaned as he went in to purchase more food for his houseguest and himself.

* * *

><p><strong>10:46 AM November 17th 2012<br>Black Order Morgue, Los Angeles Branch, California**

"To what do I owe the pleasure, Mr. Kamelot?" Lenalee asked stonily, arms and legs crossed while giving the politician the coldest glare that she could muster in her sleep-deprived state. The pathologist was beyond irritated, and Kanda, who was sitting to her left, looked ready to run the man through with the nearest sharp blade on hand.

The moment she had arrived at the Order earlier and greeted Kanda, they had set off to the conference room. They were almost there when Sachiko told them that Kamelot was waiting in his office. Now, one of the things that irked Kanda the most and happened the most frequently would be someone being in his office while he wasn't in there. He had immediately spun on his heel and stormed to his office, Lenalee rushing behind him. They had found the door locked, which was the reason for the pleasant-looking dent the door now bore. A woman that Sachiko identified as Sheryl Kamelot's assistant had opened the door, asked for a private moment for her boss, and then locked the door again before Kanda could try to kick it down. Allen and Lavi had then arrived through the front doors, bickering loudly about Allen's stomach capacity to height ratio. They both had shut up the moment they saw Lenalee and Kanda's ill intent directed towards the office door.

"Why is Yuu locked out of his own office?" Lavi had voiced. When all that he received was death glares, he turned to Sachiko. "Chomesuke?"

"A politician is here for an appointment. He and his assistant took over Kanda's office for purposes I do not wish to know," she explained uneasily, cowering a bit as Kanda's killing intent flared up. There was an awkward silence, and then Allen started laughing. It started as a quiet chuckle at first, but the priceless expression on their faces made it escalate into full-blown laughter.

"BaKanda…is truly…an idiot!" he gasped out, leaning on Lavi to prevent himself from falling over in his mirth. "Heck, I wouldn't even have to pick the lock to open it!" This earned him several stares of disbelief.

"Prove it then, beansprout," Kanda snapped once he regained his composure, "I doubt you can pick locks anyway." Allen gave him a shady smirk and then vanished into the supply room, coming out with a hammer and a 6-inch nail. "What are those supposed to do?"

"The nail is inserted into a hinge and placed against the pin, and the hammer is used to knock the pin out." Allen demonstrated, and there was a click on the floor as the topmost pin fell to the ground. "And then repeat it to the other two pins, BaKanda. Every ten-year old knows that!"

Now back in the present, everyone in the room was glaring at either Sheryl or Kanda. The room's atmosphere was tense and felt like a standoff between two armies. The intimidating silence was broken with Allen re-entering the room with a stack of files. "Why thank you, Mr. Walker." Sheryl said, gesturing towards his secretary to take to papers. Allen gave him a wary glance and deposited himself next to Lavi. "This is everything?" Sheryl asked, making Kanda nod stiffly. "Very well,"

"So what is the reason for requesting the files related to the case that Allen Walker and I are working on?" Lenalee asked frostily. The 3 men sitting next to her stiffened and swallowed their fear. An angered Lenalee was even more intimidating than Kanda could ever be. Lavi was almost choking on the malice that was seeping out of his friend. However, the gray-skinned Portuguese politician across them seemed totally oblivious to the danger.

"Because this case has already spread like wildfire in the public fear. There are talks of handing to some more, ah… powerful people." he replied silkily. Kanda ground his teeth and had to resist the powerful urge to lunge at the man's throat.

"What are you suggesting?" Lenalee all but hissed. Silence descended upon the meeting, and Allen quickly excused himself to go get coffee. Kanda glared at Sheryl, as if daring him to answer. The man stared back and then shrugged nonchalantly.

"I'm not suggesting anything, Ms. Lee. I am simply concerned with the fact that… what, only a single investigator and a forensic pathologist is going after a serial killer and arsonist." Sheryl replied.

"And three interns," Kanda butted in, unable to contain his irritation. Sheryl looked taken aback for a moment and then started chuckling.

"Fine. An investigator, a pathologist, and three interns are on this case." The man laughed, then leaned forward and looked Kanda squarely in the eye. "I overestimated you, Branch Head. I thought that at least you, the great DGM investigator would be on this case. But instead, you've assigned three people with no experience and two others with hardly anything to their name. At this line, Kanda's reason nearly snapped.

"Please do excuse the fact that the Black Order is the place which the city's backlog of cases is forced on," he sneered, "Also, Allen Walker has quite a few cases attributed to him. Lenalee Lee is possibly one of the best pathologists in the field, with a shocking autopsy speed, and yet I have yet to see any sort of autopsy report from her which skimps over details of any kind. As for the interns, each one of them is a quick learner, and each has different strengths. But most of all, they might not have experience, but they definitely have knowledge. We'll be taking back those files, Noah, until I hear from Supervisor Komui." With that, he crossed the room and snatched back the papers from Sheryl's secretary.

"Yuu Kanda, I would sorely advise you to not refer to me in a derogatory manner," Sheryl warned, a withering look in his eyes, "Just because I have a rare genetic skin condition does not give you leeway to call me a Noah."

"You started by insulting my employees," Kanda growled. "I don't care about the fact that you're a popular politician. No one insults the Black Order. And one of the perks about this place is that it's all about ability, so Central will take care to deposit any complaint you bother to submit right in the incinerator. Everyone on the case is perfectly able. So please get out of my chair and my office, you dirty Noah. NOW." One glance at the murderous aura leaking out of the people in front of them and the politician and his assistant left as hastily and dignifiedly as possible, a difficult feat when there's one irked Allen Walker waiting by the doorway to trip you as you scramble out.

"I'm extremely sorry, Kamelot!" Allen apologized without a trace of sincerity as Sheryl stood up from the ground with a huff. "Coffee, anyone?" Allen asked his friends and coworkers as he slammed the office door close. The cups on his tray were greedily snatched up and downed as Allen privately snickered at Sheryl's expression as he had fallen.

"Kanda, why are people with that gray skin condition called "Noah"?" Lenalee asked after she had finished her coffee and started nibbling the sandwich that had been hidden in her coat. Kanda pointed at Allen.

"Beansprout can explain it better." he said shortly, preoccupied with the stack of papers retrieved from the enemy secretary. Lenalee turned to Allen in curiosity, who put down his coffee mug with a sigh.

"The term "Noah" was derived from my uncle, Neah Walker," Allen began stiffly, "Uncle was a geneticist, and died four years ago as one of the many casualties of the DGM murders. He spent a lot of time studying the rare skin condition that he and many people in his family had, the one that causes gray skin. He discovered that it was because of a melanin, the pigment which colors our skin and hair. When he showed the results of his testing and observations to the scientific community, they started calling the people with this particular mutation "Neahs", but since Uncle found in a bit disturbing, they switched to "Noahs", hence the term." There was a pause as Allen's mood grew somber. "I personally don't know why it became used as an insult…"

Looking at Allen in a depressed mood, Lavi decided to rescue to atmosphere as he usually did - with a random fact. "Did you know that Sheryl was going to be the twelfth target in the DGM case?" he interjected, getting Allen and Lenalee's attention. "That's why he and Yuu are on bad terms. His daughter Rhode Kamelot was a Noah and got… err, erased by the Earl. We caught the Earl right before Sheryl got a free lobotomy." Allen turned to his boss with a raised eyebrow.

"Is telling the truth?" he inquired. Kanda grunted in affirmation and then his head shot up from the paperwork.

"Everyone out; get to work! The interns should be arriving by one!" Allen, Lenalee, and Lavi were unceremoniously tossed out as the office door slammed behind them. "Lenalee, I still need those autopsy reports! Beansprout, Central wants that paperwork before Komui makes another robot! Rabbit, get those tests done now!" Kanda roared from behind the safety of his desk while rubbing his temple to ward off the impending headache. Heeding his warnings, the trio scrambled to their respective departments.

"I hate paperwork," they muttered synonymously.

* * *

><p><strong>Sheryl Kamelot's Office, Los Angeles<strong>

"Mr. Kamelot, are you sure you need to go to San Diego?" Mimi, his secretary, asked flatly. Sheryl stubbed the cigarette he had been smoking and gave her a thin-lipped smile.

"Of course we do. There are two people in San Diego we need to "chat" with. And I'm quite sure that one of the targets located here is fleeing there," he explained. Mimi nodded, bowing her head in respect.

"How many more targets are there?" she questioned. Sheryl shrugged.

"I'm not sure," he replied. Seeing her stricken look, he hastily added, "But I can guarantee that Rhode, my daughter, and Lulubelle, your mistress, will be avenged as well." Mimi let out a quiet sigh at this and unclenched her gloved fist.

"Can we at least get rid of one more before we leave?" she requested. "The bank one." Sheryl's grin widened as he stalked off. "I'll take that as a yes." The vengeful former maid muttered as she began the preparations.

Mimi Bell, as she liked to be called, was commonly viewed as simply "Sheryl Kamelot's secretary". However, she carried a darker secret, on similar to her current employer's secret. She hadn't always worked for Sheryl; instead, she had been his sister's - Lulubelle Kamelot - maid.

It was around twelve years ago the Mimi had been disowned by her parents when they had divorced. She had only been twenty-four at the time, a fresh university graduate, and had been staying with her parents while going to UC Riverside. Thus, their divorce left her without any family, any food, or any shelter. She had been forced to drop from university, having no money left to pay for tuition and vital items at the same time. Following the other college-dropout-hopefuls to LA had landed her a job in a grocery store. But it still hadn't been enough to sustain her, so she had resorted to stealing. After being caught, Mimi had been promptly fired and was left to roam the streets.

Lulubelle Kamelot had been her savior; she had given her a job, a home, food, and became almost like an older sister to Mimi. Mimi in turn became possibly the best maid in the business, but not for the money, but rather for the sake of repayment.

Mimi had been the first one to discover Lulubelle's corpse; June 12th, 2008.

Three years later, she was still depressed. Mimi was admitted into the hospital the day of her beloved mistress's death, for an attempted suicide. She was silent and empty, just a shell. She heard of the death of people like Lulubelle, but she refused to show any emotion. And then one day, a man that she only knew vaguely, Sheryl Kamelot came in for a visit.

"Do you miss Lulubelle?" he had asked, looking out the window. The husk that had been Mimi had merely nodded despondently. "Do you want revenge?" Sheryl continued.

"How?" Mimi rasped, saying the first word she had in three years. Sheryl looked surprised, and then sat down in one of the hospital chairs.

"The Black Order. If they had caught the Earl sooner, my daughter, Rhode, wouldn't have died." he said quietly. "And neither would have Lulubelle." A spark flashed through Mimi's eyes. "So it's their fault. Especially that stupid Yuu Kanda's."

"Deal." Three days later, the woman had undergone what appeared to be a miraculous change, and was successfully discharged from the hospital. Three days after that conversation, Mimi placed a pile of papers in front of Sheryl.

"What is this?" he had asked.

"Ways to kill every single one of those damnable Exorcists that made Lulubelle die." she said simply.

* * *

><p><strong>1:24 PM November 17th 2012<br>Black Order Morgue, Los Angeles Branch, California**

"Where did you say that idiot sister of mine is?" Kanda hissed venomously, his right hand twitching towards where his gun was usually holstered. Kat shifted uneasily, and a nervous Raikou stared at his own fiddling thumbs, afraid of the inevitable wrath of Rei's elder brother.

"She went to San Diego," Kat repeated under her breath, "because she got mad this morning and was gone when I woke up. I had to call Raikou to pick me up, since she took the car- don't kill me!" Kanda's fist slammed into his desk, making papers fly everywhere. "It's your fault for teaching Rei how to knock out people by stabbing pressure points!"

"She. Is. Dead," Kanda growled darkly.

"But didn't you say that since there is virtually no excuse for an 8-hour absence, Tiedoll is pretty much in the safe range? So logically isn't Rei safe as well?" Allen interrupted, poking his head into the room. "And I finished the paperwork, BaKanda."

"Shut up, beansprout," Kanda barked. "Leave the papers with Sachiko; she knows what to do with them." Allen's head disappeared and the door closed once again. "Well, even if the killer doesn't get her, I will." Raikou blinked in confusion.

"What did I miss?" he asked. Kanda glared at him, and he put up his hands in innocence. "Hey! No one's told me anything! First I heard Lavi complaining to Lenalee about how much food Allen ate from his fridge, and then Allen yelling at someone over the phone "Since Cross is dead, I shouldn't have to take care of his debts anymore!" So what is this about Rei? I'm completely out of the loop!" the male intern complained.

"Cross was a womanizing drunkard that loved a place called the red light district and constantly racked up debts for beansprout to pay. He was shot last night, and since Cross lived in Allen's house occasionally, his – the beansprout's - house is now the crime scene. Heck, the Beansprout called an Edge End on us. So now the rabbit decided to let beansprout live with him until the house gets…cleaned," Kanda answered grumpily in reply. "And Rei is a likely target since she's tied in with the connection between all the victims." Raikou stood there, slack-jawed in surprise.

"W-what was the connection?" he stammered. Kat rolled her eyes and cuffed him sharply on the head.

"People involved in the DGM case. Rei…was roped in by _someone_ to do some… miscellaneous jobs," Kat snapped, glaring at Kanda fiercely, who looked down and muttered something, a tone of regret in the air. "Anyway… what should we do right now?"

"Could you two run some errands really fast?" Allen interposed once again, ducking the pen Kanda threw at him. "Calm down, Kanda. Just because your precious little sister left off to Tiedoll's doesn't mean that you have to go ballistic. But you two, we need to restock on some stuff." The man once again ducked to avoid the handful of writing tools that went flying towards his head. "What a waste of pens. Would you two come out here before I actually get hit?" Raikou and Kat scurried out of the office and Allen handed them an envelope with nearly undecipherable scribbling on the back. "That's the stuff we need. Money's in the envelope. Bye!" With that they were shoved out the doors and Kat was left staring confusedly at the list.

"So what does it say?" Raikou queried.

"Buy coffee beans, coffee creamer, go deposit checks in the bank, get bullets…" there was an awkward silence between the two, "…get six boxes of pens, one pack of coffee filters." Kat read off.

"It seems that they virtually live on coffee." Raikou commented weakly. "I'm guessing that their favorite hangout is a coffee shop of some kind."

"…and three dozen bottles of assorted cappuccino, mocha, and frappuccino from Starbucks," Kat finished. "So I guess that you were right. Where do you think we get the bullets?"

Raikou shrugged. "A gun shop? There's one near where _The Timekeeper_ was, if I remember correctly. So let's go get all the coffee related stuff and then drop by the bank… and then the gun store." Before they were able to move from their place right in front of the Order's doors, Lavi appeared out of seemingly nowhere and knocked Raikou on the head.

"Ow! Hey, why am I always getting hit?" he complained. Lavi just hit him again.

"Listen up. Central ships the bullets over to each branch, so it should be arriving by UPS… or FedEx, I'm not sure. Beansprout probably forgot that bit; he usually doesn't bother with supplies." Lavi corrected. "So don't worry about that. Anyway, at the bank, just tell the clerk that you need to talk to the manager. She knows us. Tell her that you're Exorcists, and mention Kanda. You'll go unaccosted and she'll let you deposit the money."

"…Where did you come from?" Raikou croaked, and the redhead shrugged in reply. "And why do we need identification to deposit something?"

"That's for us to know, you to find out! See you later, and make sure to buy the French Dark Roast, the Columbian Roast, and a bag of Blue Mountain! You'll need to go to this place… bye!" the hyper man scribbled something on the envelope and ran back in, disappearing into another room.

"Is he really thirty-four?" Kat grumbled.

"Don't ask me. He's _your_ cousin."

* * *

><p>An hour later, Raikou's car was packed with miscellaneous coffee-related items. All that was left was to drop off the check. "Kat, you can't bring your nut cracker into any bank! Isn't that common sense? Hasn't Rei told you that?" he yelled at her. He and the Russian woman had been bickering for the past two minutes about bringing her nut cracker into the bank, and he wasn't having much luck convincing her. "Besides, you can use it again when we get back into the car- it'll be like, five minutes!"<p>

"But I'll just be swinging it around!" she protested.

"So? You can play with it when we get back in the car. It's going to set off the metal detector, and I don't want to deal with a mess like that." he snapped.

"Fine, thunderhead!" Kat cried, using Rei's new nickname for him. Raikou immediately turned around and gave Kat his most bone-chilling death glare, which didn't have much effect.

"Don't call me that, you nut." he snarled back, getting out of the car and locking it, Allen's envelope in his pocket. Ekaterina got out on the other side, and the moment his back was turned, she grabbed her nut cracker through the window and stowed it in her pocket. Kat had what she thought was a good reason for keeping that piece of metal on her twenty-four-seven: Rei had modified what had once been an ordinary nut cracker into a weapon. The handles had been sharpened and tempered into stabbing points, and the part which was supposed to be used for cracking the nuts could potentially cut off a finger if one stupidly put their finger there.

When she and Rei had first gone to a bank together to pay rent, they had had a similar fight to the one just now. In the end, Rei had said that she didn't care if the item was brought in as long as they didn't get in trouble. Grinning at the old memories, Kat wrapped the steel in the signal-interruption cloth Lavi had devised. The fabric was embedded with circuits which emitted a weak electromagnetic pulse that cut off all electronic or laser signals near the cloth. To the bank's metal detector, Kat's nut cracker was just an empty sphere of air. Raikou caught her suspiciously twisted smirk and involuntarily shuddered. _Well, since the detector didn't go off, she left it in the car, right?_ he thought hopefully. If possible, her grin only grew wider at his uneasy expression.

"May we talk to the bank's manager?" Raikou asked politely to the first clerk. The man gave him an iffy glance.

"What for?" the clerk asked stiffly. "I haven't done anything for you two yet."

"Personal reasons," Kat cut in.

Once staring at the two for what seemed to be a half hour (it was only really 30 seconds), he picked up the telecom and started talking rapidly to who they assumed was the manager. When he set it down, he pointed at one of the cubicles lining the wall. "She's in the third cubicle to your right." After hurried thanks, they speed-walked to it, and were greeted by a woman around Rei's height, with long black hair to her waist, and wide brown eyes that were filled with mixed emotions. She was dressed in loose, formfitting gray and brown clothes, almost blending in with the drab colors of the office.

"Welcome. What can I do for you two? My employees didn't do anything," she asked blankly. Raikou and Kat exchanged glances and winced.

"We're Exorcists under the command of officer Kanda," Kat said cryptically. The woman's confusion vanished in an instant, and she seemed to relax in the chair.

"Ah, I see. I hate the darned formalities," she replied. "I'm Aeri Night. I used to work with Kanda at the Order, but I quit after we finished the DGM case. Too much suspense and blood," she said dismissively. "So I'm assuming that you guys are newbies?"

Kat nodded. "Yeah, we're only interns. Allen Walker wanted us to deposit some checks in the bank account." Aeri snorted derisively. _She and Rei could be related._ Kat speculated.

"Okay. Just give them to me; I'll take care of it really fast." The checks exchanged hands and Aeri went behind her computer, typing away rapidly at the keyboard. In a minute, she ripped the checks and got rid of them, having finished the electronic deposit. "Anything else?" The duo hesitated, and then Raikou decided to ask what had been bugging him.

"Why all the formality just for a simple deposit?" he inquired. Aeri's face turned to one of disgust.

"Some guy deposited a "check" in the Order's account once. It was a tracer check, and the moment the money was supposedly deposited, a program was activated that began siphoning funds from the Order. I caught it after a few days, when Komui contacted me. And then the whole code system was set up." she told them. "I'm not really an Order worker anymore. More like a financial affiliate. I'll show you guys out." She crossed her small office and opened the door, following them out. "Is Kanda still the prick he was?" Aeri asked. "I still have memories of his bad temper tantrums. Oh, and since you're newbie's, then I'm assuming that you're a bit confused by some things. I can answer a few questions for you."

"What's code Edge End?" Raikou asked, recalling his conversation with Kanda earlier. The manager nearly stopped her tracks at the words.

"Edge End..." she started hesitantly, "Stands for "Extreme Emergency". We say Edge End because it is just easier for a computer to recognize."

"Oh and why are we supposed to say that we're Exorcists?" Kat questioned after Raikou had asked more about the Edge End subject. The three of them were now in front of the glass doors to the lobby. Aeri grimaced.

"You've heard of Komui Lee, the head of Black Order North America Section, right?" she asked. They nodded. "Well, he came up with this really lame motto for the Order- "We exorcise crime from the country." So now Order employees are called Exorcists. It's a painful nickname… have you guys heard of it?"

"I'm have before." Kat replied. "I mean, I-" she was cut off by a gunshot blasting through the doors, and a bullet flew right past her cheek. Instinctively, Aeri dived and rolled to the ground, taking shelter behind a large potted plant. Kat leapt over the clerk counter, and the stunned Raikou was left to scramble into Aeri's cubicle.

"Hands up!" Five men all dressed in black and wearing odd facemasks, strode into the bank, firing shots at random into the walls. The employees and other customers screamed and immediately did so. One man aimed at the pot where Aeri was hiding behind, and she was forced to leave her cover as the glass shattered. "Where's the manager?" one of them, the foremost robber, yelled. One of the customers started dialing the police from where he was hidden, but another gunshot made the man shriek and drop it. Kat's hand dug into her pocket and she yanked out a weapon: her nut cracker. "I want the manager!" the man yelled again. The other four robbers separated and quickly began divesting the nearby people of their belongings, taking out wallets, cell phones, jewelry, and any type of valuables from them. When a little kid tried to run away, the shouting robber held the poor child at gunpoint.

"I said, where's the manager?" he roared. "Come out before this kid meets Saint Peter at the pearly gates!"From his vantage point, Raikou watched with horror as Aeri stood up from where she had been hiding and blasted the gun from the man's hand with the pistol she was wielding. Two holsters had been hidden under her jacket on her thighs, and she had both guns in hand.

"That's me." she announced, stepping closer to the man. "Let the kid go before _you_ go to Hell." The man simply smirked and raised a hand, and immediately the other four robbers stopped what they were doing a held guns to different people.

Aeri nearly had a heart attack right there and then. _Think!_ She yelled internally. _All they want is money. I should just follow procedure!_ But the other side of her, the side that had been trained and fought as an Exorcist, argued back. _Just shoot them! That man in the middle has ulterior motives. Don't do it!_ She repressed her other side and lowered the pistols. "What do you want with me?" she demanded.

_No!_ Kat nearly screamed. She would have if not for the person holding a gun to her head. Her nut cracker was under her back, in her left hand. She could probably stab the man with the handle in his stomach, but another man had someone next to her at gunpoint, and even if Kat could kill the one on her right now, the other would probably shoot.

"Drop the guns." the robber with the child commanded. Aeri carefully placed the two pistols on her counter and walked to the man.

"Let go of the child first," she hissed. The little boy was on the verge of tears, and when he was finally released from the chokehold he had been in, scurried to his mother, who was fortunately not at gunpoint. Surveying the room, Aeri's eyes widened as she observed that Kat was one of the unlucky ones. "What do you want?" she asked. The robber merely grinned widely as he stepped towards her. Aeri felt her neck hairs stiffen at the dark, evil motives that were written in the atmosphere around the man.

Hidden safely in Aeri's room, Raikou came to his senses and stepped lightly over to the phone, remaining crouched so that his height wouldn't alert the robbers to his location. Picking up the handset, he hurriedly dialed the Order's number. A familiar voice picked up. "Hello. This is the Black Order."

"Sachiko?" Raikou asked, remembering Kanda's secretary. He had only heard her speak a few times, and he had seen her nameplate on her desk to be able to remember. "This is Ikazuchi Raikou. I and the other intern are at the nearby bank right now, and a robbery is taking place. Hurry!" he whispered quickly. He silently put the handset back onto the base and curled up under the desk as he heard footsteps approach the door. It was kicked open, and Raikou stilled his breath as the gunman swung the shotgun in the room, looking for traces of human activity.

"Boss, no one's in here!" he yelled outside, stepping back out to report. Looking through the now-open door, Raikou's breath hitched as he saw that Aeri and the lead robber were facing off in a battle of glares. The man turned to his lackey, temporarily ignoring the woman's presence.

"Are you sure?" he asked softly, the murderous aura obvious in his voice. Raikou shuddered, and accidentally banged the table leg. The man spun around aimed under the table.

"Never mind, boss, I found the little rat." Fear overtook Raikou, Kat, and Aeri simultaneously as they each went on the offensive. The man that was ready to shoot the intern hiding under the table found himself in an arm lock. Grabbing the man's wrist, Raikou turned around and kicked the man over his shoulder, flipping the burly guy onto the carpet with a pop as the right shoulder was sharply dislocated. Screaming in pain, his enemy got to his feet and pulled out a knife from his right sleeve using his left hand, charging the Japanese boy. Having already predicted the motions that the blade would go through in the air, Raikou raised his knee and snap-kicked the wrist, causing the knife to fall to the ground with another scream from his new human punching bag. Grabbing the switchblade, Raikou jammed the handle at the spot between guy's neck and skull, causing an immediate concussion and fainting. The knocked-out person was promptly disarmed of his gun, and Raikou aimed at Aeri's opponent and pulled the trigger, praying that for once he'd actually hit someone with his horrible aiming skills.

Kat's fighting reflexes went on override as she withdrew her nut cracker from behind her back and stabbed her attacker's thigh, rolling into a standing position and doing a roundhouse kick towards his wrist. She heard the distinct sound of bones breaking as his wrist was pinned against the wall with her kick. Kat spun around once again and crushed his other arm's elbow with her heel. Pulling out her culinary weapon from his prone body, she leapt at the other robber near her, who had seen his comrade collapse and was taking aim at her. Pulling back her fist, Kat's hand formed a claw as she did a palm strike to his shoulder, her fingers digging into four other pressure points and thus temporarily immobilizing the entire arm. Now that his guard was down, the Russian threw a straight right at his windpipe, making him stagger and drop his gun, hands going to clutch his neck in pain. An uppercut to his chin made the robber fall backwards, knock his head on the tile, and lose consciousness. Kat picked up the guns from the collapsed men and shot across the room, luckily hitting the fourth man in the calf. She chucked both shotguns into the trash bin and rushed the last robber standing.

Aeri Night ducked the glinting knife that swung right above her head. From the corner of her eye, she saw Raikou and Kat both start attacking as she went to the ground and attempted to sweep the man's legs from under him, a classic trick. He foresaw it and back stepped, lashing out with his own foot and making contact with her stomach. She slid backwards on the tile and recovered her pistols from the counter she had put them earlier, firing off a shot as she vaulted over the table. Now behind the counter, she held the upper hand, now being able to conserve her energy for shooting and having to pull less drastic movements to dodge the bullets. However, Aeri failed to predict that her assailant would actually jump after her over the table. Aeri continued to fire, taking care to not accidentally hit any bystanders, many of which had recovered their senses and had begun tying up the bank robbers and retrieving their belongings. _I have about three bullets left in each one. _She calculated, once again diving behind a pot in order to evade shots. The glass shattered from the two bullets that were fired her way. _He's shot around five rounds, and reloaded once. So there should be five more shots left for him. I need to save bullets. _Looking at the glass shards around, her, Aeri got an idea and grabbed the largest one between her forefinger and middle finger, expertly throwing the glass at the man's wrist.

"Die!" Those were the last words she heard as a second knife was flipped out from his sleeve. The man quickly sliced the glass away from him and rushed her, stabbing her directly at the base of her neck. Black spots appeared in her vision at once, and the woman closed her eyes in time to see Kat start her own attack and a bullet whistle by.

Kat engaged the murderer with fury evident in her eyes, her nut cracker swinging in the air with eerie shrieks. Raikou too, was now shooting to kill, not caring about the consequences. Someone had died right in front of him, and it was someone that had worked with Kanda on the DGM case. _This is probably the murderer of all those other people!_ He realized.

Everything happened at once.

The killer dashed around Kat, fleeing for the employee backdoor. In that instant, Raikou's bad aim made a bullet glance off his friend's weapon, and Kat's nut cracker was jolted from her grasp and flung at the fleeing man. He staggered mid-step and yanked it out, tossing it backwards and running through the employee entrance. The steel came in contact with Kat's forehead as she promptly blacked out and a phalanx of Exorcists charged through the doors. "Cousin! Wake up!" she faintly registered Lavi's voice yell.

Raikou staggered as the adrenaline toll took over and he fell to the floor in exhaustion. _Rei. I hope we got the guy…so you don't die._

"Sachiko. This is Kanda. Get out your guns and get over here." Kanda ordered over the phone. "Your old friend is dead. It was Aeri."

* * *

><p><strong>Exile: Review? I am going to turn this in for an assignment...<strong>


	6. 5: Lost Last

**Exile: Sorry for the late update TT_TT My life...has not been going well.**

**Don't own.**

Chapter Five: Artificial

**4:31 November 18****th****, 2012  
>Los Angeles Bank of Business, CA<strong>

"Why…?" Kanda whispered, his face buried in his arms. "Why is it them, of all people?" the Japanese man was crouched in front of the corpse of his newly-deceased friend, Aeri. Behind him sat two upset interns, the male one pale and obviously shocked, and the female having the expression of a killer that was going to go murder someone, ironically enough.

"Aeri Night, thirty-six years old, bank manager, former Exorcist." Lavi scribbled on the notepad he clutched, "Victim of a supposed bank robbery. Possible casualty of follow-up killings of people connected with DGM case." Snapping it shut, he looked emotionlessly at Lenalee. "What do you have?"

"Well, this one's a cut-and-clear case of knifing to the neck." Lenalee replied, staring at the fatal wound. "There's not much more to say. What I'm surprised is that _she_ of all people died by a knife stab. I don't think we'll get off with this one easily. Aeri was well-known in the DGM case, but most of the people here simply see it as a simple bank robbery." She turned to stare at the huddle of captured would-be bank robbers which were in the middle of interrogation with Allen, not that it would help any. Kat and Raikou had testified that the man had ran through the employee entrance to escape, and that had been roughly ten minutes ago. Sachiko "Chomesuke" Kirota had already set out on the manhunt with a squad of Exorcists specialized for hunts like this, and Kanda grimaced at the expression his part-time secretary had been wearing the moment she had arrived on the scene. During the DGM case, she and Aeri had been a tag team, Aeri specializing in using knives and short-range guns while the other woman usually sniped to protect or send fatal bullets through their targets. Sachiko had the reputation-given name of "Akuma", while the current corpse was called the "Demon". The only difference that had existed between them was their area of expertise, and they had gotten along as well as sisters.

Kanda's pager buzzed in his pocket, and with a sigh he switched it on. "Did you get the guy?" there was bloodlust in Sachiko's voice when she answered,

"No. Look outside." With a glance, Kanda nearly screamed in frustration as he saw that it was silently raining, not that he had noticed in the soundproofed bank. "But check Ekaterina's weapon. I'm confident that she drew blood when the guy was stabbed. Unfortunately, I was too focused on catching the guy, so I neglected ordering someone to collect evidence." with that, she hung up and Kanda lost his temper, listing off a string of expletives that would make an Alcatraz prisoner go red. Several people looked his way and steered clear of the angry man.

"Where. Is. Your. Nut. Cracker?" Kanda ground out as he stalked towards the now terrified interns. Kat blanched and slowly shook her head.

"I-I-I don't know! Don't kill me!" she squeaked. "I blacked out when it hit me, and I just remembered it!" Kanda turned on his heel and barked at one of the other Exorcists, asking for Kat's nut cracker. When the frightened man had responded negative, his boss all but started cursing again, barely remembering his manners in time.

"Um, sir, you're looking for a nut cracker?" a woman asked timidly, approaching the raging Japanese. He spun around, making the woman flounder with her words as she stared speechlessly at his furious countenance. "I-I saw what that girl did to help us, and I thought that the least I could do was clean the blood off her nut cracker." Kanda's jaw nearly dropped as he looked at the pristine, clean, last hope that she was holding in front of her. _Must. Not. Maim_. He internally ordered. Straightening up, he gave the woman a cross glare.

"Thank you." he ground out, picking up the last shred of hope for catching his former compatriots' killer and tossing it to the disbelieving Kat. However, when he turned his back, the woman nearly snickered.

_Kanda Yuu, you are such a fool. If you weren't so famous for the case, then Sheryl would have disposed of you long ago_. Mimi mentally laughed. _At this rate, your little sister will be dead within a week._

* * *

><p><strong>(Earlier) 1:54 PM November 18<strong>**th****, 2012  
>Froi Tiedoll's home, San Diego, CA<strong>

The moment Rei got out of her car and walked up the stairs her father's porch, the door was flung open. "Ryuukei, my child! I haven't seen you for so long!" Tiedoll exclaimed happily, enveloping Rei in a parental hug. She flinched before setting down her backpack and stood stiffly in her father's embrace. "Where's Yuu?" he asked before releasing her. Rei let out a sigh.

"There's another serial killer in LA that's begging brother to run a sword through him." Rei explained. Tiedoll's face dropped in disappointment, "He's not going to be coming down at all for Thanksgiving." Her adopted father's face turned mournful.

As long as Rei could remember, Froi Tiedoll had been a painter. She wasn't sure how old he was, but he had always had his bushy hair the same monochrome gray. The man loved painting, even though by now he had retired, but he still liked to do nothing but either dote on his children or paint in the garage. She had been adopted by him at twelve years old, ten years ago, and Kanda fourteen years before that, when he had been nine. It was because of the prolonged exposure to the old man, Rei supposed, that Kanda loathed coming down to San Diego for the holidays, preferring to immerse himself in work in order to have a plausible excuse to avoid Tiedoll's excessive fatherly love. Tiedoll himself wasn't a bad father; he simply liked excessive displays of parental devotion, something Kanda detested along with Tiedoll himself. The loathing had prompted Kanda to get a scholarship into UC Davis, mostly because it was a good nine hours away and had one of the best forensic programs in the country. Kanda had originally aimed to become a pathologist before realizing he liked the hunt for the criminal more than taking care of the corpses.

As for Rei, she could tolerate it. It was better than her memories at the orphanage, at least. But even her good intentions couldn't prevent her own dislike of Tiedoll to slowly increase, so she had moved to Cal State Long Beach, two hours away from Tiedoll. (At one point in time, Kat had pointed out that a way to measure her and Kanda's dislike for their father was through how far they had moved for their universities. The siblings had denied it, of course.) An awkward smile formed on her face as she stepped politely away and dashed into the house, heading for her old bedroom tucked in the far corner of the second floor. Slamming the door shut, Rei dived into her bed, a relaxed expression spreading as she proceeded to "flip around the room", doing various martial art maneuvers for the sake of old memories. Though if anyone happened to walk in at the moment, they'd probably get the door kicked back in their face, mostly because the fact that what kept the Viet jumping back and forth, up and down the room were mechanisms scattered around the area, and one was on the door. One time, when Kat had tried to copy Rei by "flipping around the room", but all that she had succeeded in was getting a concussion.

Being the doting parent that he was, even after Rei and Kanda had adamantly moved out, Tiedoll still did thorough cleanings of their rooms every week, which was probably why her room was still clean. Normally, if anyone inadvertently wandered into Kanda's room, they'd immediately shut the door. Kanda had filled his room with various weapon models, encyclopedias, and it was even worse than Rei's, with cords running everywhere. It was impossible not to trip, unless you were one of the siblings. Rei was pretty sure that the cords were still there, as same with all the other dangerous stuff. Her own room was much more organized, but also had cords running everywhere because of the many computers and the gaming systems. At several spots on the room's walls and ceiling were also black pads expressly for her to "flip around the room", since it was required for her to be able to leap everywhere.

"Rei!" Tiedoll called. "Come downstairs!" the words interrupted Rei in mid-air as she leapt clumsily on one of the wall pads, tumbling to the floor because of her lost momentum.

"Frag grenades." Rei cursed. "Who is it?" she yelled down the stairs.

"It's Yuu's friend. He wants to see you!" Tiedoll replied, making Rei frown.

"Kanda isn't here!"

"I don't mean I want to see Kanda, I want to see Rei!" a slightly familiar voice clarified. As she ran down the steps, Rei internally scowled at the confusion her brother's name often caused. When she reached the ground floor, Rei was greeted with a tall, black-haired man with messy hair and facial tattoos.

"Oh…hi Alma." she greeted uneasily. Alma Karma had been Kanda's best friend, and she personally didn't know much about him other than the fact that he and Kanda were like. "What do you need?"

"I heard you were interning at the LA branch!" he said happily, causing Rei to nearly walk into a wall. "How is the intern program going? Komui was transferred here yesterday to evaluate and see if we could take in any interns."

"…Hah?" she asked, face screwed up with incomprehension. "What do you mean?"

"Oh, I'm sorry!" Alma promptly apologized. "I work as an investigator at the Order's San Diego Branch. Komui Lee…well, Kanda should've told you about the whole Section Head thing."

"He didn't. What are you talking about?" Rei admitted. Alma raised an incredulous eyebrow. "Ok, well he did, but I completely forgot."

"You're exactly like he said you were." Alma snickered, and Rei had a hard time not hitting him in the stomach. _Well, you're exactly like Lavi._ She internally retorted. "The Section Heads have to travel to every branch once a year to do inspections. And as you know, there's only one Section Head per region, so you get the idea. Komui has to do a lot of travelling."

"No wonder he's so attached to Lenalee whenever he sees her." Rei mused. "Anyway, what's your business here?"

"Want to come over to the SD Branch and check it out? And perhaps convince Komui to let us open up the internships." Alma pled.

"Why would Komui listen to _me?_" Rei couldn't help but snort. Alma shrugged.

"You're Kanda's sister. You're bound to be able to be just as intimidating as him!" With that, Alma dragged Rei out of Tiedoll's house and to his car. "Come on! The Order is boring without newbies to make fun of and order around!"

"I knew it." Rei muttered in the car. "Brother is incapable of making friends with normal people."

* * *

><p><strong>2:42 November 18<strong>**th****, 2012  
>Black Order San Diego Branch, CA<strong>

"I'm never driving with you…again…" Rei rasped as she staggered out of the car. Alma just looked at her with pity and shook his head. "You are worse than Kanda when it comes to driving!"

Affronted, Alma glared back, "At least I haven't been arrested for going over the speed limit, unlike him." Rei rolled her eyes. "I'm telling the truth!"

"But…you cut cars too fast, too often! I nearly had a heart attack!" she hissed back. "I swear, you're going to get into an accident someday! And then Brother will be even sourer for the rest of his life!"

"The chances of me getting in an accident are lower than me committing suicide. And I won't be feeling suicidal anytime soon." They had arrived in front of the Black Order's San Diego Branch, which contrasted greatly to the Los Angeles building. Instead of being dark, innocuous, and all-around gloomy, this one was huge, flashy, and had a much busier air about it. As people walked in and out of the buildings, Rei sensed a more energetic aura rather than the tired and exhausted one that Kanda usually had floating surrounding him.

"Hi, Alma! I thought you wouldn't be back for a while, what's going on?" A woman greeted as Rei was shoved in the building. "And who's this?"

Alma flashed a broad smile, "Kanda's little sister! She's going to help us convince Komui to open up the intern program here!" The woman froze at the name.

"K-Kanda? Um, I – I need to go get some more coffee, bye!" with that the brunette scurried away, reminding Rei much of a mouse. Alma sighed and shook his head.

"Rou Fa is absolutely terrified of your brother. Kanda is just like that. Anywho, Komui is THIS WAY!" the investigator explained before dragging her to another large set of double doors. When she tried to escape from his grasp, Alma's grip only tightened. "Don't be like that! I want some newbies running around here! It's not fair to let Kanda to have all the fun!"

_Scratch him being like Lavi, he's Lavi and Allen together! _Rei internally panicked. Lenalee had told her about Komui Lee before, and only a few sentences had been positive. When they got to the doors, Alma kicked it open, and Rei grew even paler. They were in a conference room and had obviously just interrupted a meeting. There were four people present: a man with familiar dark green hair and wearing a beret, a blond woman with a burn scar covering half her face and a monkey on her shoulder, a man with black hair and extremely pale skin, and another blond, a man with a similar beret on his head. _God save me now. Or kill me now, whatever's faster. These people are worse than brother! _The woman was the one to speak up first.

"Mr. Karma, what is your business here, interrupting a conference?" she said in a frigid voice. Rei winced, recognizing her right away. Klaud Nyne, head of the Black Order San Diego Branch, a person that could probably best even Kanda at hand-to-hand combat, had the only record of zero cold cases in her twenty years of working at the Order, and was _absolutely terrifying_. _Even worse than Lenalee with two scalpels! _Rei remarked to herself. She had no good memories when it came to Kanda and Klaud in the same room. In fact, possibly the best memory was when the woman's monkey had attacked Kanda. But other than that…

"Sorry, Klaud! But anyway, I brought an intern from the Los Angeles to sing the praises of having the intern program here!" he said bluntly, shoving Rei n front of the piercing gaze of the four people. "Ryuukei, this guy with the beret is Komui Lee, the blond with the beret is Bak Chan, the dude that looks like a vampire is Krory Arystar, and my boss is the woman, Klaud Nyne!"

"I know, I know." Rei muttered, swallowing nervously. _Great, I'm in a room full of insanity. _"It's nice to meet you again." Klaud raised an eyebrow.

"Aren't you Kanda's little sister?" she asked frostily. Rei winced. "I remember you. How is that idiot doing? Still running around doing cases like the brute he is?"

"Kanda's sibling?" Krory cried, looking alarmed. "Is she here to recon for Kanda? I remember she kept on throwing little plastic bats at me!"

"No, Krory, you're thinking of Lavi's cousin." Bak said kindly. "But I think that yes, she was sent by Kanda."

"You're all wrong!" Rei burst out, embarrassed by the bad reputation her brother had. "I came down here for Thanksgiving with Tiedoll! And I never threw bats at Krory; I only gave them to Kat to throw! And big brother is not a brute, he's just an idiot!"

Silence.

"Ahem." Komui coughed. "Will you two please get to the point?" At this, everyone in the room glared forcefully at Alma. "Inspector?"

"Ah, oh, sorry! Rei, you do the talking! I'm going to get coffee for everyone!" the hyper man promptly scrambled out, abandoning Rei in the room. The glares turned to her.

Stuttering, "Um, the intern program is very advantageous as to the fact that since the Black Order is full of elites, interns get to learn a great deal. Also, they can help doing minor things like running tests, thus freeing up time for more important things. And furthermore we can…contribute ideas that probably weren't thought of before?" The gazes intensified. "I don't know! Alma just dragged me here, begging me to ask you guys because it's boring without fresh recruits running around!"

"You're nothing like your brother." Bak commented in a relieved tone. "Thank God. A second Kanda Yuu would be the death of us." Something in Rei snapped.

"Don't compare me to my brother." she snapped. "I'm not a dense, obtuse, imbecilic stupid older brother idiot. I'm nothing like him. _Understand_?" her voice had changed to something more threatening and menacing; a killing aura was around her, and Klaud noticed that Rei's entire body was tensed, as if she was going to leap for Bak's throat.

_Nevermind. Siblings are alike, even if they're not related by blood. _She thought with a grimace. "Is that it?" Rei paused for a moment.

"One second…is there any employees here that worked on the DGM case?" Rei questioned, becoming serious. Klaud blinked at the sudden question.

"Yes…there's only Alma and I that work in this branch." Krory spoke up. "I'm the chief pathologist here. Alma worked with Kanda. Why do you ask?"

Rei let out a long sigh. "There's a serial killer up in Los Angeles. They've been targeting people that worked on the DGM case. Miranda Lotto, Hitoshirezu Mizu, and Marian Cross are the ones that I'm aware about." Silence once again pervaded the room as Komui gestured to an empty seat.

"Sit down and tell us everything."

* * *

><p><strong>4:45 PM November 18<strong>**th****, 2012  
>Froi Tiedoll's home, San Diego, CA<strong>

Rei fell backwards on her bed. After a grueling interrogation by any Black Order Branch Head, anyone would be exhausted. And undergoing said interrogation with the Section Head as well…was ten times the pressure and resulting fatigue. Alma had considerately driven her home after he had popped back in the room – right after the interrogation was finished. _He just has perfect timing._ Rei thought sarcastically.

She was jerked out of her internal rant by the sound of her phone ringing loudly. Tapping the screen to pick up, she put it to her ear. "Hello?"

"Where are you?" Kanda roared, making Rei flinch at the volume. "Stupid sister, where the _kutabare_ are you?"

"No need to cuss!" Rei muttered, "I'm at Tiedoll's!"

"…Watch out! I'm serious this time; the guy just struck again! And protect Tiedoll, too. I'll be coming down there the moment I get authorization." With that, Kanda hung up, leaving Rei with a dead line. She stared at it with disbelief written across her face.

"…No…not my dad…" she whispered, curling up into fetal position. "Please, God. No."

**Exile: I don't blame you if you want to yell out "KANDA IS OOC" because he is. But sadly, the purpose of this fic in for my grades, not FFNET. Maybe after I turn in this whole story, I'll go back and edit it for fanfiction - worthiness.**

**Review?**


	7. 6: Artificial Exorcist

**Exile: Hihi again ^_^ I don't own.**

**Sorry, a little bit more of OOC Kanda in here TT_TT**

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><p><span>Chapter Six: Artificial Exorcist<span>

**7:43 AM November 19****th****, 2012  
>Froi Tiedoll's home, San Diego, CA<strong>

"Run." Rei registered as she picked up the anonymous phone call, "Flee for your life, _courier_." Rei froze as the line went dead and the person hung up. A text suddenly appeared on her screen.

_Run for your life courier. Run before you die, along with everyone else._ The Viet shivered in fear. _I am watching. If you tell anyone, including that brother of yours, everyone you hold dearly will die. _

"If they're watching me…" Rei muttered, leaping out of bed and swinging the curtains open, "then they should know if I do _this._" Stepping out of the balcony, she looked down and raised her hand, sticking up her middle finger. Suddenly, the all-too-familiar sound of a gunshot boomed through the usually quiet neighborhood, forcing Rei to flip backwards and dive for safety into her closet. A hole appeared in the wall pad above her, the bullet having penetrated the thick rubber. With wide eyes, Rei army-crawled to the balcony door, slamming it shut and closing the curtains. "That…was too close for my liking."

The sound of something clacking on her desk prompted Rei to turn around as a bullet fell from the wall pad and rolled off the hardwood. Striding over, she picked it up and stared at it apprehensively, a plan forming in her head.

It all depended on how good Kat's memory was.

Rei picked up a pencil and quickly began scribbling symbols of individual sheets of paper, one symbol for each phrase. After some thought, she picked up each paper and tacked them to one of the 30 black pads in her room, leaving three of them blank. "I'm sure glad that I didn't unpack anything yesterday…" going her room one last glance, Rei grabbed her stuffed backpack and ran downstairs, where Tiedll was sitting at the dining table, sketching the outside scenery.

"Mmm…good morning, Rei…" Tiedoll said slowly, focused on his art. "Where are you going?" Rei stopped in her tracks, remembering what brother had done a few years earlier.

* * *

><p><em><span>Flashback| –| Begin<span>_

"_GAH!" Kanda roared, tossing down several photographs on the coffee table and interrupting Rei's and Tiedoll's concentration. "This guy is absolutely insane!" his sister blinked several times before going back to the codes Kanda had given to her to quit bothering him with complaints of boredom. So far she had "God created men unequal. If the actions of humanity can be defined as black and white, then the shades of gray do not deserve to exist..." and there was still a few more documents left. So far though, Rei had already finished one other page and was already thoroughly creeped out. The handwriting, according to one of Kanda's friends at his work, was one of a person that was introverted, aggressive, and had rather dark thoughts (which were pretty accurate, considering that she was decrypting codes left at certain crime scenes, not that she needed to know that)._

"_What's wrong, Yuu?" Tiedoll asked calmly, used to Kanda's short temper. _

_Jabbing a finger at the photos on the table, "This guy is so freakin' messed up! Who the hell would string up the dead bodies of dead people with their skulls cut off, huh? He's insane!" _

"_Obviously." Rei retorted, nibbling on her pencil. "All serial killers are insane." Kanda gave her his patented death glare. _

"_Quit being a smart-aleck. What I mean is that I haven't heard of any serial killers that would bother to do something as elaborate of that. It sounds like something out of…a story some freshman wrote!" he snapped crossly. Tiedoll sighed and picked up the photos, wincing at the gruesome content._

"_Whatever." Rei said dismissively. "It's your case not mine- ooh, that's what that stupid curlicue meant!" she jotted something down on her sheets of code-filled paper."This guy started replacing spaces with those stupid spirals and it looks really ugly. And the curls look like E's, so it just messes things up even more!"_

"_I don't need to know about that." Kanda snorted, "That's your codes to play with. What ticks me off is the darn crime scenes! There's an obvious hint to the killer in each one, but _I can't figure it out!_" he complained._

"_If you align the photos on each other, they spell the word "Earl"." Tiedoll commented, "And half of the letter M." Kanda froze, looking at his father disbelievingly. _

"_What? Wait, are you serious?" he cried, taking back the photographs and lining them up chronologically, by first to last victim. Just as Tiedoll had said, the corpses spelled out "Earl". "Why Earl? What does that mean?"_

"_If I remember correctly, back in the day that a lobotomy – surgery to remove part of your prefrontal cortex – was popular, there was a serial killer running around that went by Adam Earl. He was caught, but he escaped prison somehow, before his death sentence could be carried out. If he was still alive, he would be around… sixty-five-ish. He was pretty much a genius back in the day, got his doctorate at eighteen." Tiedoll suggested. "Maybe this guy is related?"_

"…_thank you." Kanda said grudgingly. "I'll look him up when I get back to the Order, and I'll make sure to credit you."_

_Rei shoved a paper at Kanda. "Here, this one's done. Quit giving me messed-up codes when I'm done with these. I better get credited too."_

"_Fine, fine. Just hurry up, stupid sister."_

"_Shut up. You try cracking codes made by madmen."_

_Flashback| – |End_

* * *

><p><em>Dad is a likely target. <em>Rei realized, looking out the window. _If I leave, then they might try to kill him. If I stay, both us could die. _

"Ryuukei?" Tiedoll asked pensively, "What's wrong?" Rei glanced at him and then back outside.

"Dad, can I see the picture that you did of Brother and me when we I was first adopted?" Rei requested carefully, keeping her eyes outside on the conspicuous and suspicious silver Land Rover outside. _Since when did they sell silver Land Rovers?_

Tiedoll looked delighted, "Of course! I still have it hanging up in my room!" he stood up from the table, putting down his drawing pencils and leading the way to his bedroom, Rei right behind. "But where are you going?"

"I'll tell you later." Rei said vaguely as Tiedoll opened the door.

"Here it is!" he exclaimed, waving his hands at the large portrait on the wall. "You were just twelve at the time!" Before he could say any more, Rei's hands descended on his neck, and he went limp and collapsed on his bed.

"I'm sorry, dad." Rei apologized, stepping out of the room and locking the door. Tiedoll's room had to be opened from the inside, and she had made sure to leave his keys next to him. There were also no windows, so he was safe for the time being as long as he didn't wake up anytime soon. Sparing one final glance, Rei rushed to Kanda's room, revealing the Colt M1911 that was hidden in a slit in his mattress. A few minutes later, she holstered on a Smith and Wesson 19. "It's a good thing that Kanda left his old weapons here." She commented to herself. Also in the mattress were at least three good Army knives, which Rei strapped to her thighs and upper left arm.

Going to her room one last time, Rei grabbed a black cap, putting it low on her head. Then, instead of exiting the front door, Rei circled around to the back door, vaulting over the gate and landing safely in the bush-lined pathway. Taking out the Colt, she fired off two bullets into the back tires of the car which she had seen snipe at her earlier.

The sounds woke up the neighborhood, and a woman came out from the Land Rover to examine the source of the gunshots. A whistle of air greeted her ears as the back tires simultaneously deflated, and the person bent down to check on them.

Turning around, Rei went back over the fence and into Tiedoll's garden, scaling over another wall and getting off in the neighbor's backyard. From there, she snuck through their rose bushes and leapt over their gate, now a street away from the mysterious shooter. Letting fear take over her body, Rei sprinted away from what was going to turn into destruction.

* * *

><p><strong>8:09 AM November 19<strong>**th****, 2012  
>Kanda Yuu's apartment, Westminster, CA<strong>

It was a common fact that Kanda meditated every day, every morning, and would viciously maim anyone that dared interrupt his meditation without good reason. No one could ever accurately guess when Kanda was busy meditating, so no one dared ever to drop by apartment, which was just how he liked it. So when his Order-issued pager rang, the man cracked open one eye and regarded it balefully. Usually anyone in their right mind that called him in the morning would quickly hang up after the first ring after remembering that he did not like to be disturbed, period.

The electronic continued beeping its annoying, Komui-made beep and Kanda's eyebrows furrowed in annoyance. Unfolding himself with a resigned sigh, he crossed the floor and picked up the call. "Hello? This is Branch Head Kanda Yuu." He said, a trace of irritation in his voice.

"It's me, Klaud Nyne, reporting from the San Diego Branch." Klaud answered back. Kanda nearly dropped his pager; he had no good memories associated with that woman and it was highly likely that there would never be.

"What do you need?" he asked tersely, wanting to hang up as soon as possible.

On the other side of the line, Klaud took a deep breath, "I-I'm sorry, Kanda."

"Alma Karma is dead."

The pager went crashing to the floor the moment the sentence was uttered. Kanda stood there, transfixed in shock. The pager, having survived the fall, continued to transmit Klaud's voice. "He didn't report for the early morning shift today, and he missed a meeting. Rou Fa decided to go run up his paperwork to him in case he was sick, but when she went to his house, no one answered. So she went around the back gate- everyone here knows how to get into Alma's back gate – and she saw his body hanged in the kitchen. After hyperventilating, she drove back to the Order and rushed to me. We have a team at his house right now, including me. I just thought that you'd like to know, since you were childhood friends after all."

Kanda took a shuddering breath and picked up the pager, turning off his emotions for the moment. "Tell me, were there any fires when you entered the house?"

"Yes. It was upstairs, so we only found out last minute. His bedroom was on fire, but we managed to extinguish it."

Alma had worked on the DGM case. **Check**. There was a fire in his house. **Check**. Alma was now dead. **Check**.

"I'm getting authorization to go down there with the team that is working on this case." Kanda said flatly. "It is highly likely that Alma's death was done by the same person as a serial killer up here."

Klaud went silent for a moment. "Komui says that he gives you permission, and that he'll fax over the paperwork in a moment."

Kanda started, "Komui is down there?"

"Yeah. Don't you remember?"

"Well then tell him that I'm also bringing Lenalee, Lavi, Beansprout, and two interns." He ordered before hanging up. Taking a deep breath to calm himself, he started packing for a few days down in San Diego, only packing the bare necessities. His suitcase full a few minutes later, Kanda strode to his sword collection and unlocked the glass case, selecting two long blades.

He was highly proficient with fighting with one-handed swords, having practiced kendo when he was little and then taking other classes as he grew older. Kanda was actually skilled to the point that he had obtained a teaching license for swordfighting, although he didn't bother with classes. It was more just decoration for him, so he could have legal license to keep highly dangerous weapons in his house. It helped that he worked with the Black Order, too. Kanda was…decent with guns, but he preferred fighting with swords in the end. They were harder to dodge and the right ones could potentially deflect bullets. His swords had taken down many criminals, and each one had saved his life in many situations.

Picking up his pager from the ground, Kanda sent off a message to Lenalee and Lavi, who would tell Allen. As for the interns…he would have to pick them up himself. Sighing at the job ahead of him, Kanda picked his briefcase and left the apartment, a large overcoat on to conceal his swords. No need to draw more attention than needed.

Driving to Long Beach, Kanda reached first Raikou's house, barging in and ordering the confused guy to pack up and get in the car. Then he drove to where Rei and Kat lived, set off a few traps by accident, gotten her up and out to the car, and met up with Lenalee, Lavi, and Beansprout in front of Cal State Long Beach, paperwork in hand after picking it up from his office at the Order.

"What happened, Kanda?" Beansprout asked sleepily and earning a knock on the head. "Ow, hey BaKanda, that hurt!"

"We need to go to San Diego. Now. Alma is dead, and he fits all the killer's criteria. It's easy to conjecture that Alma was killed for working on the DGM case." There was silence in the little group, and then Lavi sighed.

"Well then, I'm glad I brought a minivan." he commented. "Get in, you guys. We'll carpool to save gas…and for Lenalee and Yuu to not get in any accidents."

"Hey, I've only gotten pulled over for speeding _once_." Lenalee said defensively.

"And for the last time, don't call by my first name!" Kanda added.

* * *

><p><strong>At the same time, with Rei…<strong>

Crouched in an alley, Rei examined the situation at the beach. Apparently, there was a press conference taking place down there, as some popular politician from LA had come down for a series of meetings considering the rising crime rate. If she went, she could hide in the crowd and lose the person trailing her in the same silver Land Rover as she had shot earlier. However, where she was hidden in a parking structure was at least 500 yards from the fringe of the crowd, and the silver car was continuously circling, looking for her. Rei was currently on the third floor of the parking structure. In reality, the question was to jump or not to jump.

Gripping the concrete, Rei glanced down at the sidewalk, a good twenty feet away. With another glance at the Land Rover, Rei took a hesitating breath and leapt, dragging her body against the wall to slow herself down and landed in the bushes with a few scratches and a new hole in her shirt, not that she cared. Her first priority was increasing the distance as fast as possible. Spinning on her heel, Rei changed her mind. Instead of heading for the crowd, she turned and ran towards the Black Order.

* * *

><p><strong>12:43 PM November 19<strong>**th**** 2012  
>Black Order San Diego Branch, CA<strong>

"Hello, Kanda." Klaud said coldly, engaging Kanda in a battle of frosty glares. Meanwhile, a certain pathologist found herself being hugged to death by her older brother, Komui Lee. The group from the LA branch had made it to San Diego, and they were currently being greeted in the front lobby.

"My darling Lenalee!" the man cried in a high-pitched, whiny voice, clutching his sister protectively and wailing aloud. "How are you? Have any despicable men dared try to flirt with you? Has anyone started stalking you? I missed you~!" a poker smile formed on Lenalee's face as she attempted to escape her brother's grasp.

"No, Komui, I'm fine. No one has tried to hit on me, and I don't have any stalkers." She said in a soothing tone, the way one would talk to a small child. The tears that had been a metaphorical waterfall stopped immediately as Komui let her go, straightened his clothes, adjusted his beret, and then handed a suspicious device to Lenalee. "Komui, I don't need a stun gun!"

"But this isn't just a stun gun! It's also an Order pager, has a tracking device installed so I can check on you, and has an electric output of over 900 volts!" he whined. The rest of the people present all shook their heads in resignation.

"Che. Stupid sister-complex," Kanda muttered, "and mad scientist. Who the heck needs a stun gun when they carry two daggers on their person twenty-four seven and is capable of disarming a grown man with her bare hands? And at the same time turns weird whenever they hold anything resembling a scalpel in their hands?" Lavi gave him a knowing look.

"Rei is pretty proficient with martial arts already; but no, you had to teach her marksmanship. Looking who's talking, Yuu." he commented snidely, ducking the punch that Kanda threw at his head. Turning serious, "Klaud, what's the status with Alma?"

Klaud shook her head, "Homicide. Krory already finished the paperwork; he could hardly do the autopsy. I really don't blame him, being so close to the inspector. Anyway, he was first knocked out, and then the perpetrator hanged him, causing immediate death by broken spinal cord." Silence descended, and everyone bowed their heads in respect for the dead.

Leaning to her cousin, "Who is this Alma person?" Kat whispered. Lavi looked at her crossly before replying.

"He was Yuu's best friend. Alma worked with him on the DGM case." He explained. "Klaud, did you tell Krory to be careful?" she nodded.

"If I could ask, could one of you keep guard? Krory has a lot of stuff to do, and he has a habit of being rather…unnoticeable. I don't have any people to spare at the moment." The monkey on Klaud's shoulder widened its eyes innocently, as if asking the same thing as its owner.

"I can watch Crow." Lavi volunteered. Seeing the odd looks, "Hey, Krory looks like a vampire, but he'll bite you if you call him that! So Crow is the next best thing!"

"Can you please stop with the ridiculous nicknames?" Kanda ground out. "And fine, go ahead. I need to go check on Rei and Tiedoll now. Give me the keys." Lavi blinked several times and handed the keys to Allen.

"I trust Beansprout here with my car more than I trust you. Sorry, Yuu!" Lavi ran into the pathology wing, ignoring Kanda's infuriated roar. Allen stared at the keys that Lavi had shoved in his hand.

"Fudge. I hate driving." He said simply before going to the car, "Kanda, I remember where it is, no need for directions."

"Noooooooo! Don't take my darling Lenalee!" Komui wailed, clutching his sister once again. Lenalee gave an exasperated look and hit his head.

"Komui! I'll be back later, so quit whining!" she scolded. "And where's Reever? You're a Section Head, so you have a lot of paperwork you need to finish! Get to work!" As if on cue, a man with sandy hair appeared and dragged Komui away by the arm. "Thanks, Reever!"

"Tell your brother to quit making more work for me! He's always running off to do his robot blueprints!" he called back. Allen shook his head.

_Some things never change._ He thought wryly. "Now let's hurry to Tiedoll's."

Fifteen minutes later, the group had reached Kanda's old home in the suburbs. They approached the front door cautiously, afraid that Tiedoll too had become a casualty. When the door didn't open, Kanda took out an old pair of keys that he never used and fitted one of them into the lock. The door opened easily. "Tiedoll? Rei? Where are you guys?" his voice echoed everywhere as he started searching the rooms, everyone peeling off to help search.

When they got upstairs, Kanda headed towards Tiedoll's master bedroom and knocked on it. No answer. "Tiedoll, open up!" he yelled. Still no answer. "Beansprout, can you open the door like you did at the Order?" he asked blankly, having tried to kick it open several times. Allen snorted derisively.

"No, BaKanda. If you haven't noticed, this door opens on the inside, so there's no hinges to unpin. I can lockpick it, though." He said congenially, pulling out suspicious pieces of metal from his pocket.

"I don't care, just hurry!" he snapped. Allen shrugged and inserted the metal pieces, and in a few moments the click of the lock unlocking greeted their ears. Kanda barged in and rushed to the prone figure of Froi Tiedoll. "Tiedoll! Wake up!" when there was so reply, he started shaking him.

"Mmm? Ah, Yuu! I thought that you weren't coming down for Thanksgiving!" Tiedoll exclaimed in mid-shake. Everyone in the room froze. "What's wrong? And where's Ryuukei? Last thing I remember is that she wanted to see a picture…and then she knocked me out?" Kat suddenly ran in the room.

"Hey! Hurry to Rei's room! It's whacked up!" she ordered, running back down the hallway to the black door. "Look at the walls!" Allen blinked.

"What are these symbols?" he asked confusedly. "They…look really odd." Kat shook her head.

"It's a message! And look!" the Russian held up a piece of paper with a sentence on it and a bullet taped to it. "According to this, Rei was targeted and sniped at. This is the bullet!"

"What do you mean by a message?" Raikou asked in a bewildered tone. There was a short silence and then Kanda couldn't help but start chuckling.

"That idiot." he uttered, going to sit on the bed. Resting his weight on his hands, Kanda threw himself into the air, rebounding on a wall pad and pushing off another one. The man became almost like a blur to the others, moving so fast in the small room that their heads were moving back and forth to catch his movements.

"What…the heck was that?" Allen asked when Kanda had stopped bouncing around the black objects on the walls.

"The code." Kanda said simply. "Raikou, Ekaterina, take pictures of each symbol. Lenalee, Allen, go find a hotel for us to stay. I'm going to convince Tiedoll to come with us for safety. Understood?" They all nodded in agreement.

* * *

><p><strong>6: 25 PM November 19<strong>**th**** 2012  
>Black Order San Diego Branch, CA<strong>

"I'm so hungry." Rei whimpered, curling up into fetal position. She was currently in a tree overlooking the front of the San Diego Branch, and had been able to lose whoever had been tailing her. However, night was approaching, and her backpack had been barely enough to hold some crushed bags of chips and other space-friendly foods like dried cranberries, as well as three blankets and two shirts and jackets..

As for why she had chosen the Order to camp near, the answer was to help keep watch over Krory. She couldn't rely on luck to prevent the killer from claiming yet another life, so Rei had to take matters into her own hands. She was hidden in a particularly dense clump of trees, so no one looking at her hiding place would spot her, blended in with the dark green leaves. The tree wasn't the most comfortable of places, but it worked. She had climbed up by using the Army knives to cut small footholds for easier climbing, and had managed to scale the ten-foot tree in a matter of seconds. Her training had helped too.

At the moment, Rei had the Colt M1911 aimed at the front doors as a just-in-case. She couldn't be too cautious or paranoid. Not in this situation.

_Grrrrumble_

Now, her immediate problem was getting something filling to eat.

* * *

><p><strong>Exile: Lazy author is an in-deep-trouble author.<strong>

**Review? (Note: This is going to be turned in within a week! . )**


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